140mins
Genre: drama/crime
Director: Derek Cianfrance
Writers: Derek Cianfrance, Ben Coccio, Darius Marder.
Cast: Ryan Gosling, Eva Mendes, Bradley Cooper, Ray Liotta.
Plot
An unconventionally
scripted film split into three stories which arc over two generations of
characters. Luke a fairground trick motorcyclist
who discovers an ex lover has had his baby.
He is desperate to do right by them, and stays in town spending time
with mother and son.
Unable to earn good money at anything but motorcycling he
takes up bank robbing, but things don’t go according to plan especially when he
crosses paths with ambitious local cop Avery, who coincidently also has a baby son. Fifteen years pass by and old secrets well
kept are revealed to the two children who are now young men.
Review
Gosling
gives a stand out performance as Luke the motorcycle stunt rider, a man on the outskirts
of society, a drifter, anxious to do right by his son and ex lover Romina. He is gentle and simple soul but when he
settles in Schenectady, New York (translated from the Native American as, the
place beyond the pines) he becomes entangled in the morals and constructs of
urban society. It becomes his cage and
he has no idea how to operate within it, attacking and injurying Kofi, Romina’s(Mendes) boyfriend and turning to crime to earn money.
Avery
(Cooper) is in his own cage, stuck in a corrupt police department, he turns the
tables on the corrupt cops and launches a political career. This part of the film is somewhat weaker as
it’s such a big story to be launched into with little set up, half way through
the film. The pace of the film slows as
we catch up with the change in direction and lead character.
Again in
the third part of the film we are introduced to new characters, the sons of
Luke and Avery and their story, still the pace sluggish. The end is fitting and lyrical though, when
Luke’s son goes beyond the pines and out into the American west.
As I said,
it’s a slow film and a little clichéd but worth the effort for Goslings soulful
performance full of depth and simplicity.
4 out of 5
stars.
