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>One of the points that the filmmakers are expressing that
>I've been most impressed / encouraged by is this idea of
>asking questions more than giving resolute answers (Gosling
>has gone so far as to frame it almost as a "whodunit" with the
>mystery left up to the audience). Moreover, they've made a
>point about Williams' character defying all this standard
>relationship philosophy that says you should be thrilled and
>satisfied to find a man who loves you and your child, like
>what could be wrong if that exists. And what of a man who
>wants nothing more than to love his wife and child?
EDIT: SPOILERS ahead . . .
Having now seen it, I think the movie is not really a whodunit. It's slow land erosion. There isn't one incident that the whole movie turns on. It doesn't lay things out that simply. Why things get to the point they do . . . like Cindy says, "I've had it up to here." The dissolution we see is just the crushing culmination of a bunch of stuff explicitly detailed on screen and then not. I think that latter point is one of the movie's narrative strengths: the feeling that these characters exist beyond what we can specifically measure on film; that's the documentary effect, not just that we're voyeurs to their joys and pains, but that there's a sense of real lives being lived, inside and beyond what's captured via camera.
Dean drank, was childish, and offered nothing in the way of professional ambition. Cindy wanted more for herself through her work and wanted more for her daughter's future than the bitterness and anger which had swelled up at home (and which she seemed to realize more than Dean ever did). Dean would complain Cindy never had time for him, and when Cindy was with him she felt trapped by a life she (and he as well) never planned for. The movie doesn't wish to play heroes and villains with its characters and doesn't pretend to offer any resolutions that would come as a result of that narrative convenience. It asks questions of the audience more than giving them easy answers.
In terms of how the story is told, it's the difference between a light operated by a switch and the sun rising and setting. The light is switched on and off in an instant, and we can point to someone who's making it that way. The sun's just on its natural course, slowly changing its position over the length of the day, all of us dealing with that change in our own way.
I loved this movie. I've followed its development over the years, from when it was to be set in a CA beach town to its premiere at Sundance almost exactly a year ago. Obviously, it's not going to be everyone's cup of film-making, but I thought it was rather special. Any knocks against it I have are of the nitpicking variety, e.g., the one scene where Rawls gets angry early on and then later when Dean is talking about his dad came off a bit too-on-the-nose (read: scripted), especially for a film that feels extraordinarily organic throughout. Also, there's maybe a minute total of dialogue that seemed too-Cassavetes-ish, where characters speak in a banal or repetitive fashion in an effort to feel more "natural". And that's really it. Not only are the performances noteworthy, as has been the movie's most commonly acclaimed feature, but it's really a demonstration of smart film-making overall.
In particular, the way the movie is edited and the story laid out was brilliant. Movies that cross-cut or jump time tend to do so with narration or other narrative gimmicks that detract from what's going on, typically in an effort to make things easier for the audience. As a result, those movies feel less like a complete work than a bunch of scenes hashed together. And while I have no idea if the structure of the original script follows the path the finished film did, the cutting across time technique enhances the movie tremendously. For instance, there is a palpable sense of inevitably that builds as the story goes on due to this editing technique; in doing this, it supplies a rich and surprising context to the past and particularly the present scenes. Take the scene in the past where Cindy and Dean first play their song, Penny & the Quarters' You and Me. We've just seen this horrible fight take place between them in the present, and although the embrace set to music in a vacuum is romantic and sweet, it takes on a dimension of sadness and even anguish when paired with the fight.
That Penny & the Quarters bit was one of the first clips to be released promotionally, and finally seeing it in the greater context of the film as a whole, it becomes something quite different than what it was initially. Interestingly enough, when Cindy and Dean are dancing to the same song in the Future Room scene, while we have not yet learned on screen of its significance, it does feel special, as that one sequence represents the one moment of romance or togetherness at the hotel and the last one in the time-line of their relationship before the dam finally ruptures.
The cross-cutting during the wedding sequence also brings with it incredible melancholy and heartbreak, as though watching cherished home videos as a tornado is ripping apart around you everything you love. You feel so wrapped up and enthused by how they fall in love on one hand and are as equally crushed by how it breaks apart.
But anyway, the point is the editing really highlights the duet that the movie is all about, all those contrasts that are there: past / present, falling in love / falling out of love, ambition / indifference, expectations / surprises, desire / repulsion, youthfulness / aging, etc. A song in one scene takes on a different tone in another. A fight in one scene puts one of our characters in a place opposite where he is in another scene involving a physical altercation. Phone calls, oral sex, money, etc. all are shown to have contrasting qualities or differing responses with the passing of time.
I also think the cinematography needs to be praised more. There's nothing really showy going on, but the aesthetic differences between past and present subtly underscore the shifting tones in the film, while the camera-work also gently and capably enhances but does not overpower the performances on screen. I don't know if any blocking or such plans were in place in scenes like the one on the bridge or the final 4th of July sequence, but that the film was able to capture the give-and-take between characters without a bunch of edits was another substantial achievement.
Lastly, about the performances . . . Ryan Gosling has been good-to-great in material ranging from bad-to-average-to-great. He's strong once more here. From his class-indicative articulation to his drunkenness, he plays as precisely as is needed, as close to the edge as possible, so as to not come off as scenery-chewing. His breakdown in the family kitchen, his anger stoked by a sense of desertion in the doctor's office, and his tenderness in the abortion clinic are all superbly expressed. I also think Gosling is the best actor working today as far as creating a unique physical personality / environment for his characters.
Now Michelle Williams I've liked before, but I've never really been too impressed with the movies she's been in. However, she's absolutely outstanding here. By far, it's my favorite performance of the year and probably surpasses even Samantha Morton in Morvern Callar as my favorite female performance in the past decade. The range she exhibits is astonishing. From her goofiness and attraction on the night date, to her skepticism in her early encounters with Ryan's character, to her brokenness in the abortion clinic, to her anger in the hotel room, and so on. She looks and feels every bit a wife and mother exasperated and frustrated by her husband, pushed to the point of almost surrender and subversion, in dire need of something better for herself and her daughter. She's without inhibition or vanity, giving as true and as captivating a performance as I can recall. The motel floor "sex" scene is what the words gripping and raw were made to describe.
And the greatest compliment to pay either actor, and Derek Cianfrance too, is that as good as Gosling and Williams may be when you look at their individual work, it's in the sense of chemistry and reality they create between their characters, in good times and bad, that is the movie's most lasting quality.
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