The Place Beyond the Pines

Derek Cianfrance achieved both critical and box office success with Blue Valentine back in 2010, notable for its forceful portrayal of a young couple's turbulent relationship and starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams. Gosling has acquired an immense following in young cinema audiences: women want to be with him and men want to be him. A year after Blue Valentine, Gosling starred in the crime thriller Drive and cemented himself as both a powerful screen prescence and as a Hollywood heartthrob. In The Place Beyond the Pines, he teams up again with Cianfrance and the result is a film which is powerful, intense and really rather remarkable.

The Place Beyond the Pines – like Drive – locates Gosling's character in isolation. A bike stunt rider who is constantly moving from one town to the next with his show, Luke (Gosling) discovers that he is father to a son whom he never knew existed. Determined to provide for both the child and his mother, Romina (Eva Mendes), Luke turns to robbing banks in desperation to make sure his son doesn't have the childhood that he endured. This decision has fateful and far-reaching consequences for both him, his son and Avery, an ambitious cop played by Bradley Cooper.

Cianfrance's film is epic in its ambition and strives to be intelligent and thrilling. Its script spans some sixteen years and the film's narrative modulates between three distinct acts. What starts as a crime thriller rooted by Gosling develops into a police drama centred on Cooper, culminating in conclusions about family, fatherhood and the legacy of history. These gear changes could quite easily have been as jarring as those on The One Show but Cianfrance's direction and investment in his actors' performances helps to keep the audience on-side. Gosling's portrayal of a tattooed, violent, but well-meaning, biker was mesmerising and for every second he spent on screen, I was fully engaged in the story. Cooper's performance was as impressive as the one he gave in Silver Linings Playbook and together with Gosling, was the main reason for the film's success. A strong supporting cast coupled with an intelligent script really did make for fantastic viewing.

With moments of genuine power and flashes of shocking violence, The Place Beyond the Pines is a hugely atmospheric film. From a confident opening shot, following the anonymous figure of Gosling as he moves through a fairground in preparation for his stunt act to a moving soundtrack from composer Mike Patton, a real sense of emotional power and tenacity was developed which wasn't released until long after the credits rolled. The film's ending may be seen by some as a little too neat, but the strengths of the rest of the narrative do more than enough to make up for this. Its 140 minute run time might seem rather long for a drama which is primarily about fatherhood but every minute felt justifiably included. The ambition and passion of Cianfrance for the script (co-written with Ben Coccio and Darius Marder) is largely responsible for the film's grand scope but this shouldn't be seen as a negative.

Perhaps The Place Beyond the Pines' most impressive achievement is how it handles its changes in tempo and creates some really memorable images. Luke's confident (and rather intimidating) exterior breaking down in church whilst watching his son being held by another man during his baptism; the cautious smile of Avery's son finally accepting his father and the frantic chase sequences between police and criminal, between Luke and Avery, between two men who essentially want the same thing – security for their sons.

It may not be totally perfect, but The Place Beyond the Pines has a beautiful energy under its surface and all its elements (from plot to performances to cinematography) combine to create a film which speaks with dramatic lyricism and uninhibited ambition. It is unsettling, emotive and reassuringly human and, like Cianfrance, can only be applauded. 

Clapperboard Reviews: * * * * *