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Release date: March 20, 2013
Starring: Ryan Gosling, Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes, Rose Byrne
Directed by: Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine)
Premise: A motorcycle stunt rider considers committing a crime in order to provide for his wife and child, an act that puts him on a collision course with a cop-turned-politician.
This would be 1,000 times better is Gosling's character's name was "Rider".
Pretty fucking excited for this. It looks real good.
That poster is hilarious...
More white people problems. :elitist:
Get it, because in Drive, his name was... and in this one he rides a motorcycle, and...
Forget it.
That poster is pretty bad but god damn this looks really good.
I agree with you guys, this looks brilliant
This is not good.
One of the most anticipated films at TIFF this year was undoubtedly "The Place Beyond The Pines," writer/director Derek Cianfrance's follow-up to his acclaimed breakthrough "Blue Valentine." The filmmaker reunites with his 'Valentine' star Ryan Gosling for an ambitious tale about crime, family and injustice. The film opens with a bravura tracking shot showing tattoo covered Luke (Gosling) flipping a switchblade open and closed inside a trailer before the camera tracks him outside, across a carnival fairground and into a tent where he mounts a motorcycle and races into a 360 cage with two other riders going full speed. The cinematography here by Sean Bobbitt ("Shame," "Hunger") is designed to make film geeks' jaws drop and it totally works.
After the show, Luke is approached by Romina (Eva Mendes), one of likely many women who he's probably had trysts with while rolling through town. But he finds out that he's fathered a child with her and decides to quit the carnival to raise his child with her. Things are complicated because Romina has a live-in boyfriend who doesn't care for Luke showing up and because the former stunt driver doesn't have a job or any money to take care of the family he's trying to reconnect with. Enter Robin (Ben Mendelson) a slithery sycophant who offers Luke the chance to earn some money by using his driving skills to rob a few banks. If seeing Gosling portray a stunt driver and man of few words who moonlights as a robber and plays surrogate dad to a woman and her young son who have now moved on with another man, it's because you live on planet Earth where you saw him do this last year.
Like his "Drive" character, Luke is a man of few words and so his emotions are expressed by the cigarettes dangling out of his mouth, his brooding, his motorcycle riding. After seeing the young actor go play such a range of roles last year ("Drive," "The Ides of March" and "Crazy Stupid Love") it's disappointing to see him leaning on the same tricks here. When his character is allowed a lighter moment — making a dog dance by lifting his arms up and walking him around — it's clearly a bit of improv. Gosling put his faith in his director but has unfortunately been let down. As things are motoring along with a string of successful bank robberies we're eventually introduced to Avery Cross (Bradley Cooper), a good cop who ends up crossing his path.
For the first hour or so you would swear you were watching Cianfrance remake "Drive" as a melodrama but then the film switches gears and the focus shifts to Cross' character. The film then dives into the corruption and moral grey area in the police department. But the longer the film went on the less I believed in what I was seeing. The filmmaker is in love with 70's grit, heavy improvisation and tough guy posturing but it all amounts to a movie that doesn't have much to say. The women in the film — Mendes and Rose Byrne as Cross' wife — aren't given much to do besides suffer quietly beside their brooding counterparts. By the time the credits came up, I started to think of Cianfrance less as the next great indie hope and more as the next Joe Carnahan.
Cianfrance took a risk with the structure of the film, essentially offering an intimate epic in three parts but by the time the film started over for the third time I no longer had the patience to care. "Blue Valentine" managed to find some authentic moments among the improvisation that helped define the relationship but the present day stuff but that style is at odds with a genre film like this one. I won't completely write him off after this film but next time he's going to prove that he actually has something to say.
Quote from: modage on December 22, 2012, 08:14:14 AM
If seeing Gosling portray a stunt driver and man of few words who moonlights as a robber and plays surrogate dad to a woman and her young son who have now moved on with another man, it's because you live on planet Earth where you saw him do this last year.
This sentence makes no sense. There, my first playlist proofread.
( I think you forgot to say "sounds familiar" )
Yep. Add those words. It's not a Playlist proofread though cause that's just from my Tumblr where I don't really give as much of a shit.
I didn't think Drive was about a goddamn thing and also I think it's hard but necessary to disengage oneself from linearity when watching a movie (it's my #1 goal for my next Django Unchained viewing), like people in the future might not watch Drive first and they'll know we were wrong if we are wrong maybe the future is wrong, anyway. Looking forward to this.
The similarities to "Drive" aren't why it's not good. They just don't help.
Honestly kind of expect a ceiling on my appreciation for this one, I think Blue Valentine has a ceiling. I think Drive has a ceiling for that matter.
Quote from: Neil on December 21, 2012, 08:31:04 PM
More white people problems. :elitist:
I used to think this too, but do you know how many films we'd have to ignore if we considered that...?
Pretty much all of them.
As hard as it is, I'm learning the importance of "checking your politics at the door" and just accepting the reality of the story..
but im willing to hear more on the subject of "
Politic-Curbing vs
Enjoyment" though!
I even thought about starting a thread on this subject maybe a hundred times before but just never knew how get into the subject, or even what the hell i'd say beyond what i just said...
yeesh. blah... b'la... BE-LAW...
okay
on the subject of relevance:
The Place Beyond the Pines actually looks like it could be good! or at least a much better story than
Drive.. but nothing will ever be better than
Drive's opening sequence.
and i loved Blue Valentine, and this cast, so maybe this is Gosling's way of making it up to me...
"
Hey Teef, sorry for getting yr hopes with Drive, but here's take two with a better story and Ray Liotta!"
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Quote from: 72teeth on December 23, 2012, 03:59:17 PM
I used to think this too, but do you know how many films we'd have to ignore if we considered that...?
Pretty much all of them.
I'm being sarcastic. I think it's a thin and ignorant argument.
Quote from: Neil on December 23, 2012, 10:16:12 PM
Quote from: 72teeth on December 23, 2012, 03:59:17 PM
I used to think this too, but do you know how many films we'd have to ignore if we considered that...?
Pretty much all of them.
I'm being sarcastic. I think it's a thin and ignorant argument.
well more than the race thing, i meant checking whatever politics you do hold close: gender roles, gun control, socioeconomics.. anything that takes you out of the story to think more PC.
I guess im just trying to figure out if it's a writer's fault for not considering
all issues, or if a viewer should be just that: a viewer, with no critical thinking.
1. I didn't really like Blue Valentine (though it had its moments)
2. Does Mod like anything anymore?
3. This trailer looks good.
4. That poster is one of the ugliest things I've ever seen. That's on purpose, right? The question is "Why?".
That can't be an official poster. There's no way. It's a photoshopped paparazzi pic:
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Mike Patton's doing the score for this? So weird.
Anyway, I'm looking forward to this one. Blue Valentine was some quality sadness porn, I'm hoping for some decent drama in this.
Saw it. Fairly agreed with Mod on this one. It's kind of a ridiculous movie, which I want to respect, but this is the sort of movie where too much happens just because it's the easiest way for the plot to work, and by the 10th bit of easy happenstance, it just got goofy. It often skirts with being funny not on purpose. It's supposedly about sons and legacy, but not in a serious way; the fathers and sons are linked by lazy genre tropes more than anything else.
Perhaps it would have been better if it were longer, because things happen too quickly for them to carry the necessary weight. Basically the characters that need to bump into each other do so immediately upon walking into a roomful of new people, then it cuts to "and now they're best friends!" Stuff like that. The story wants to be twice as long as it is, and the solutions to make it a 2hr movie are kinda lazy.
That's upsetting, I had high hopes for this.
Lots of people love the movie. I think The Playlist gave it an A.
I THINK I get why some people like the movie. I just get more why people don't like the movie.
I probably like it a bit more than Mod. There are a lot of good parts, mixed in there with some not good parts.
Trailer's good, though.
Quote from: trashculturemutantjunkie on April 11, 2013, 12:24:49 AM
??? lottery (young person?) the way you respect the people who haven't liked the movie is the same as those people or other people might respect you liking the movie! everything is ok
(haven't seen this movie yet, btw, 'cause of [reasons unrelated to movie criticism])
Woah, I see what you mean, lemme explain. I think my mind realises that sort of criticism is wholly possible. My hopes and dreams aren't smashed yet but I'm reacting to that point in autopliot.
I don't know, I'll try to turn off the weak-plot development-detector in my brain when I watch it.
ray liota is the best, dude's been doing great stuff since narc (yes of course early in his career too). even in heartbreakers he kills it.
this and killing them softly seems like a good start to a great year for him. there is a pivotal scene near the beginning of killing them softly where he gives one of the best and most understated performances of the year. it's such a gripping scene, and really it all comes down to how he handled it.
i can't wait to see this Friday.
saw this with kinda random people, like nonmovie people, enjoyed it very much and was surprised the guests also enjoyed the movie!! intricate and dynamic mixture of external mechanics and internal emotions. movie felt surprisingly realistic, engaging, mysterious
anticipated combo of refn's drive, heisenberg's the robber, surprising (to me) addition of blue valentine and other blue-collar stories, like snow on tha bluff, etc. kinda happy it wasn't too much like beasts of the southern wild or bernie or whatevs, just satisfied by its feelings and my feelings
movie is well made but 13-32% boring maybe, based on expressed and nurtured details and categories. long stories, maybe too long? idk. but it's like, please keep movies feeling like this if possible, please. thx
good job, imo
SPOILS
ya great job, i saw it with a bunch of friends too. some hated it, some loved it. they both had good points, my one friend saying "that's the kind of idea i would have had when i was 19 and never actually made it" as much as i really liked the movie, i somewhat agree. There is a sophomoric quality to the film, but then again that's the charm.
though i really like how the cycles of abuse are shown without any character saying what they're feeling. the fact that he could never look his son in the eye aided in his development one way toward apathy, whereas the step father on the other boy's side (while still troubled) put him on a path that took him away from ending up in the same place his biological father came from.
i really like the side characters, and in general i feel American cinema is really starting to nicely find a good balance between good qualities and bad ones. much like with john goodman in flight, i found goslings boss to be very well developed. you kind of despise him, but also like him because he's smart and knows when to draw the line. he also has a very endearing quality of caring about people, yet doesn't seem to care for himself too much.
I'd like to see this again when it's on video; already knowing the twists to see if it stands up.
I agree with these guys^, this film is one of the most underrated films I've seen in a while. I never wanted it to end. To add to their comments above, the cinematography has to really be commended. Certain compositions, and movements within the frame were extremely dynamic to watch. Sean Bobbit is the fucking man, I hope he stays partners with Cianfrance on his future films.
Seriously, don't listen to the crap that's being said about this one. There's a very sprawling epic quality to this that is very rare to find in movies these days. When a movie has this much greatness, some of the weaker elements should be excused flaws that make it what it is. And Gosling was purely mythic.
*Did ANYONE notice the TWBB score used all the way through that second act? That was ridiculous.
Quote from: Cloudy on April 16, 2013, 02:11:44 AM
*Did ANYONE notice the TWBB score used all the way through that second act? That was ridiculous.
wtf really? That's unforgivable.
back to not caring about this movie.
Not the Greenwood stuff. I think Arvo Part's "Fratres." So it's not really from the TWBB score.
Still unforgivable though.
funny and dazzling that 'unforgivable' feels like a thematic link to the movie. mmmmmm
Interestingly enough To The Wonder has the same song. But Pines uses it way more obviously. It even has that DONNNGG at the end like TWBB. This movie has been getting the wrong advertising (as if it's like Drive when it's not at all), and weird hate. This Cianfrance guy is the real deal I think.
*yup, Matt is right. Not from Greenwood's stuff. Didn't know that. That's probably why Malick used it as well.
This movie wants to be about regret, guilt, consequences, sons and fathers, and maybe even coincidence (sound familiar?) but doesn't take the time to actually be about any of that. It never sits and breathes with any of these moments and instead breezes by them as if they're on some sort of checklist, like "Ok Bradley Cooper talked about not being able to look his kid in the eye, whats next? Oh right, dirty cop stuff!" As a result, it ends up feeling like a first draft that was packed with ideas and never revised or ironed out. There's like 10 films in here but we only get snippets of each one and it ends up feeling like a jumbled meaningless mess.
This movie will age like "Boondock Saints" btw so let's just preserve this thread for posterity.
Quote from: modage on April 17, 2013, 04:04:01 PM
This movie will age like "Boondock Saints" btw so let's just preserve this thread for posterity.
don't say that! come on now...
Quote from: Tictacbk on April 17, 2013, 03:53:22 PM
This movie wants to be about regret, guilt, consequences, sons and fathers, and maybe even coincidence (sound familiar?) but doesn't take the time to actually be about any of that. It never sits and breathes with any of these moments and instead breezes by them as if they're on some sort of checklist, like "Ok Bradley Cooper talked about not being able to look his kid in the eye, whats next? Oh right, dirty cop stuff!" As a result, it ends up feeling like a first draft that was packed with ideas and never revised or ironed out. There's like 10 films in here but we only get snippets of each one and it ends up feeling like a jumbled meaningless mess.
i think it not sitting and breathing these moments is exactly what makes it good. i'm not totally against your point but having characters talk about their feelings is bad narrative (that we've all come so used to) 101.
I came here expecting nothing but hate, but I'm pretty amazed people here liked this.
Like a really rushed indie version of "Crash". So full of really poorly-written cliches and forced plot devices.
It's so rushed, yet too long.
It's too bad, had some good performances (probably the first time I really thought Bradley Cooper was good in something). Just shows how much a terrible screenplay can ruin a movie.
Even Ryan Gosling saw this movie and decided to quit acting for a while.
Quote from: RegularKarate on April 20, 2013, 11:49:34 AM
Like a really rushed indie version of "Crash". So full of really poorly-written cliches and forced plot devices.
that is a really good point, however i do think it's attempting to be much more earnest than the counterpart. but you're right, and the basic premise does work against the film inherently.
(my letterboxd.com review)
i don't understand what this movie is about.
cianfrance is an excellent actor's director. like blue valentine, every performance has INCREDIBLE life and realness. i want to know his secrets.. how he gets everyone to be so real all the time. Pines is very watchable for that alone. most of the story feels really contrived, like cianfrance just wanted to put his characters in these situations... ryan gosling's character is kind of an idiot/douche. i feel like there's a very slight chance rewatches will make the ideas clearer, and i'm down for another view, but right now this movie as a whole feels like a huge mess of underdeveloped ideas. like, idea after idea after idea isn't necessarily a movie. it's just a lot of stuff that happens.
sweet dirtbike chase though.
BONUS XIXAX OBSERVATIONS:
- i was surprised by how Lynchian some moments were. the whole gosling character feels very Lynchian/purely archetypal/cinematic... almost surreal. the surprise narrative handoff from gosling to cooper to the sons reminded me of Lost Highway, structurally.
- Fratres is a pretty famous bit of music... Meet Joe Black/Thomas Newman ripped it off first i think.. it's definitely getting overused now though.
I think that my favorite part about this was how it's set in Schenectady. I don't see many New York movies that take place outside of the city. The rest of the state seems like such a drab and boring place by comparison, and it is, but I like how Cianfrance used that mundane aspect of the area to contrast how Gosling's character rips through the town like a whirlwind and fucks shit up. Certain shots looked so familiar, I think it's the trees that gave it away. We have very particular ones around here that just become a blanket of green in the summer. I had never seen Upshit New York portrayed so beautifully, the cinemtographer did a great job on that. I'll mostly be rewatching the movie for those parts because they proved to me that you don't have to be in the city to get some cool looking stuff around here.
On the subject of trees...I was wondering about the title. I had expected there to be some 'place' under the 'pines' where Gosling goes to ride his bike and maybe ends up burying some people there, but I don't remember seeing any pines in the movie. Maybe I wasn't being observant enough because there are a few woods scenes... At the end I took it to mean that Luke's son is headed out west, AWAY from the pines? They can grow everywhere, but certainly less in Cali than New York, and from Luke's look he definitely seemed like a Cali kinda guy. So I'll take that as the meaning.
I had many problems with this movie. The entire third act was just shit. I would've been fine with them following around Cooper in the aftermath of the shooting, even if it really is a buzzkill ending, but when those kids show up and befriend eachother it's like "What are we, starting a NEW movie here?" I guess that's what DC was going for with "The sins of the father will be visited upon the son" logic, but the point behind him spending that big of a chunk of screentime on these two douches was totally lost on me. All the sudden I felt like I was watching a TV movie. In the beginning, although I had some major issues with Gosling's acting ( you're not a 'tough guy' ) and Cianfrance's writing in particular, I was still pretty much riveted by it and it was hitting on every cylinder for me. I just wish DC wasn't trying to be so ambitious in making 'more' than a genre film. IT'S A FUCKING GENRE FILM!! can you just wrap it up in a nice little bow where someone dies at the end, but we're left with a glimmer of hope as to what the future holds for them? That sentimental shit was really grating on me, and throwing Dane DeHaan (AKA Mangey Dicaprio) into the mix was like pouring salt in my wound.
In summation, I respect Cianfrance for trying to go above and beyond, but he overshot on this one. Dude needs to learn how to hone a story in. I liked about half of it, parts of it looked very beautiful, Gosling was in top goofy form. I'll watch it again for how awesome the first part is, but I doubt the director's pandering to the audience at the end will gain any profundity the second time. He was obviously trying to sidestep genre cliche's by doing something different, more meaningful than that. Well, sorry dude. You failed.
Quote from: Reelist on May 18, 2013, 11:55:16 AM
On the subject of trees...I was wondering about the title. I had expected there to be some 'place' under the 'pines' where Gosling goes to ride his bike and maybe ends up burying some people there, but I don't remember seeing any pines in the movie. Maybe I wasn't being observant enough because there are a few woods scenes... At the end I took it to mean that Luke's son is headed out west, AWAY from the pines? They can grow everywhere, but certainly less in Cali than New York, and from Luke's look he definitely seemed like a Cali kinda guy. So I'll take that as the meaning.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenectady,_New_York
"Schenectady" is derived from a Mohawk word that means "place beyond the pines."
VARIOUS SPOILS
Okay, I quite liked the first two thirds of this film for the most part. Though by the time it was half-way through Cooper's section, the movie started feeling kind of fake somehow. The saddest thing about this film was how it fell apart in the final third.
I really like the idea behind it all, the whole fathers and sons thing but the last chunk of the film really did not do justice to the concept.
There were some parts that worked pretty well on a emotional and dramatic level though. In terms of pacing, the film seemed to get faster and faster which really made the later sections weaker.
Also, I couldn't stop thinking that Bradley Cooper Jr was just Bradley's Cooper's douchebag half-brother or something. And boy was he a douchebag.