Review of The Place Beyond the Pines (2013) by Megan T — 19 Oct 2013

This epic triptych of stories has lofty ambitions as we first witness Ryan Gosling as Luke Glanton, a bank robber trying to do best for his new born child followed by Avery Cross (Bradley Cooper, in a great role), a policeman who after becoming a hero has doubts about the force he works for, before the story turns to two teens showing how their father's sins echo throughout the generations in the final act.

First, the good things - Cooper puts in an excellent and believable performance and there's a great score by Mike Patton but the film is a ramshackle set of clichés (seen elsewhere) and far, far too long for its rather simple and quite obvious message.

I'm not sure how much more of Gosling's lonely/moody criminal shtick I can take as we see his motor-vehicle entertainer doing robberies and being violent around a mother/child family dynamic and I'm convinced I'm back watching Drive again.

With that film, Only God Forgives and now this, Gosling needs to step outside his comfort zone. It could be a simple case of just making a few films with similar themes in such a short amount of time but Eva Mendes is so skinny I barely recognise her and, like in many films, Bruce Greenwood enters at the midpoint which thankfully improves the movie.

The second story fares no better in the originality stakes as Cooper takes the reins and just as I start to think this section reminds me of Killing Me Softly with Ben Mendelsohn on hobo duties, up crops Ray Liotta from that film too! Thematically it covers similar ground with crooked cops and money exchanges and I finally begin to think that every bit of this film is another film in disguise.

Dane DeHaan is a superb actor (Chronicle being my fave of 2012) but again, in the final act he plays an outsider, the disturbed teen fighting against his alpha classmates in the film's closing story.

The narrative just about hangs together despite some implausibilities but overall I couldn't feel that the whole thing had been covered in more depth in very recent movies. Not a complete catastrophe, the film only disappoints because of its familiarity despite my favourite Bradley Cooper performance to date and a mediocre realisation of its big aspirations.

6/10 Midlands Movies Mike.