I always complain about explosive-laden action movies, but there’s another end to the spectrum of film that is equally obnoxious. This category is inhabited by films like The Place Beyond the Pines, pretentious and dull movies that feature hamstrung plots and cliche-ridden dialogue. Oscar bait like this legitimately angers me, as not only does it waste my time, but it also wasted the time of the people acting in it-- they could have been doing something much more interesting with their careers instead of starring in this quasi-indie crap.
The Place Beyond the Pines stars Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper, although contrary to what the posters and trailers lead you to believe, the pair share only a few split seconds of screen time. The movie starts out as a story about Gosling’s foray into bank robbery, and it’s quite strong here-- Gosling delivers with one of his stronger performances, and the robberies are entertaining and fun. But when one of them goes wrong, he is shot and killed by a cop (Cooper). The entire focus of the story then shifts over to Cooper’s character, and later moves again to Gosling’s son, who is out for blood to avenge his father’s death. I understand that this movie is supposed to handle dark themes about fatherhood and how one event can change a person’s life, but there came a point in the film where I just didn’t care anymore.
The dialogue is mediocre at best, and moves at an astronomically slow pace-- I actually found myself watching it in 1.2 x speed, as that was the only way I could make it through the characters interacting without falling asleep. Director Derek Cianfrance makes the mistake of getting right into the drama, without an intro to establish the characters and make the audience care about them. As a result, we are left with several scenes between Gosling and his girlfriend, played by Eva Mendes, where we don’t know or care about what is going on. The plot itself is straightforward, but it is buried under layer upon layer of boredom and treacle. The worst thing I can really say about this movie is that I’m indifferent to it. It bored me, and I didn’t even care that I was bored.
The cinematography, however, is spectacular. Scenes of urban blight are interspersed with slickly-filmed heist sequences, and the style is one of the few things that actually coheres in the film. Even though I saw the movie several months ago, several of the shots have stuck with me, especially the moment of Gosling’s death. But even with the visuals, the movie tries to be oddly poetic, which doesn’t work when the audience doesn’t give two shits about the characters being filmed. You could film a dead rat with a beautiful range of primary colors, or with a great camera lens, or in sepia tone, but at the end of the day it’s still just a dead rat.
Fortunately, Gosling and Cooper bring enough charisma to the table to actually power the movie briefly, although Gosling clearly has the easier task. After he is shot and killed, Cooper has to then steer the movie in an entirely different direction, shifting the audience’s focus to a completely different story. It’s like starting a movie over halfway through-- it doesn’t work. Cooper brings as much as he can to the table, and Gosling fits his role perfectly, but neither of them are quite able to keep this movie from venturing into pretentious territory. Also, I wanted these two actors (who are widely considered to be two of the best young actors working today) to actually have some moments together onscreen. But while Gosling was on, I kept waiting for Cooper, and when Cooper finally showed up, I didn’t care about his story.
A balance between these two is never found. Perhaps the film would have been better if the two storylines were spliced between each other, alternating back and forth and finally culminating in Gosling’s death Memento-style. However, this would make a boring movie even more confusing than it already is, and there’s not much that can be done to save a film that the audience has stopped caring about. The story ends up going on far too long, and by the time it starts focusing on Gosling’s son, it has become too scattershot to entertain.
Final Score for The Place Beyond the Pines: 5/10 stars. I respect certain aspects of this movie, and parts of it are certainly enjoyable, but I can’t abide with most of the plotting, dialogue, and weak characterization. The film is incredibly flimsy, and eventually gets crushed under the immense weight of its pretentious message. The acting is fine, the cinematography is great, but if these two good aspects could have been used in the service of a better overall movie, we would have a serious Oscar contender here. Instead, all we have is a simultaneously weighty and fluffy piece of pablum that is one of the many, many overrated movies of 2013.
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