Reason.com
Blue Valentine
Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams undone by the mysteries of love.
Blue Valentine charts the course of a doomed relationship from blooming euphoria to baffled collapse, and is so suggestive of real life in its eccentric particulars that by the movie’s end, you feel you might almost run your fingers over the spiritual scars incurred by its two protagonists. The picture is somber but not entirely bleak, and in the performances of Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams, doing some of the finest work of their careers, it’s enthralling.
Gosling is Dean, an amiable but aimless young man who’s perfectly content knocking around in the world of manual labor—moving furniture, painting houses. Dean may be light in the intellectual-depth department, but he’s a soulful romantic. This at first appeals to Cindy (Williams), a fellow New Yorker with a scuffed and drifting heart. Cindy once dreamed of going to med school, but has wound up working as an assistant in the office of an oily doctor (and fending off a callous ex-boyfriend). Upon a chance encounter, Dean instantly decides that Cindy is the girl of his dreams; he has to have her, pursues her, and before long wins her. Soon she announces that she’s pregnant; and even though she’s unsure if the baby is his (“Probably not,” she says, blankly), Dean is exultant: A home and family would make his uncomplicated life complete. Cindy’s dreams are blurrier. Would a simple future with Dean really do?
The script, written by director Derek Cianfrance with Joey Curtis and Cami Delavigne, conveys this story in contrapuntal layers that illuminate the characters without schematically explaining them. It interweaves sweetly offbeat scenes from the couple’s beginnings with raw vignettes from their bitter end, and in doing so it stirs unusually complex emotional responses. At one point, during an early nighttime walk down a city street, Cindy and Dean duck into a storefront entryway where he serenades her, on a ukulele he’s been carrying, with an impromptu rendition of "You Always Hurt the One You Love." Cianfrance presents this glowing episode in a detached medium shot, with Gosling’s back to the camera, and the lack of manipulative close-ups allows us to enter into the scene on our own initiative. Later, when Cindy, conflicted about her pregnancy, decides to have an abortion, we accompany her to a (real) Planned Parenthood clinic. There we listen as she recounts her melancholy sexual history, then watch as a doctor prepares her for the procedure. This extraordinary sequence has the shifting shape of life being lived, in all of its awkward ambivalence, and Williams’ precise command of behavioral detail gives it a heart-clenching power.
The movie was given an initial MPAA rating of NC-17—a commercial death sentence. The objection was to an oral-sex scene that was no more graphic than a similar interlude in last summer’s The Girl Who Played with Fire, which was rated R. After strong pushback by distributor Harvey Weinstein, the MPAA relented, and Blue Valentine, too, now carries an R rating. This industry command-and-control exercise was more-than-usually silly: The movie offers nothing that might attract the coveted young-male box-office demographic. It’s an adult film in the most admirable way, dealing with the mysteries of love and personality with level-eyed candor. Michelle Williams is fearless in the film’s most intimate moments, and superb throughout; and Ryan Gosling’s portrayal of a small-timer with a large heart but not much else is a thrilling accomplishment. His Dean is a heedless optimist confronted by an obstacle he never imagined to exist. In the end, he can’t keep Cindy because he never had her—and because of who he is, he never could have. “Tell me what to do,” he implores her in one of the film’s most grievous moments. “Tell me how I should be.”
Kurt Loder is a writer, among other things, embedded in New York.
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Realist|12.29.10 @ 12:05PM|#
This is just another stupid article about nothing. What the fuck does this matter?
|12.29.10 @ 12:38PM|#
What's wrong with some movie reviews, asshole?
|12.29.10 @ 1:00PM|#
THIS^
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:34PM|#
Well dick licker boy....this ain't the place for them! This is suppose to be REASON, get it. There is not much that is more inane than movie reviews with the possible exception of you.
|12.29.10 @ 4:10PM|#
This is an internet blog, you dumb fuck.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 9:14PM|#
Come on be honest, you didn't figure that out by yourself...you stupid bitch!
mr simple|12.29.10 @ 12:59PM|#
You know you don't have to read and comment on every article, right?
|12.29.10 @ 1:23PM|#
I thought mandatory commenting was part of Obamacare?
SFC B|12.29.10 @ 1:36PM|#
Not only is commenting mandatory under Obamacare, but under the Commerce Clause he HAS to see the movie.
Christina|12.29.10 @ 2:20PM|#
Winner
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:36PM|#
I do it to help you get a little smarter. But you can't really fix stupid.
|12.29.10 @ 4:11PM|#
Did you learn that from self-experimentation?
LarryA|12.29.10 @ 2:30PM|#
There's this great thing about the internet. It's big. There's plenty of room for you to start your own blog about what you think is important.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:37PM|#
I would never start a blog of movie reviews and call it REASON!
|12.29.10 @ 4:13PM|#
For a blog called
ReasonHit & Run...Dumbass.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 9:18PM|#
Where's the reason, bitch???
Trespassers W|12.29.10 @ 12:16PM|#
Hey, isn't that the chick from Dawson's Creek? Good to see that she's still getting work.
I wonder what happened to the dark-haired one.
|12.29.10 @ 1:00PM|#
She married a queer.
steve|12.29.10 @ 12:22PM|#
What's next reason, book reviews?
|12.29.10 @ 12:41PM|#
Why the fuck not? It's not as if some other post gets thrown out just because this one went up. How 'bout you just scan past it instead of taking the time to make a bitchy comment?
H&R polled last year on what readers wanted to see more and less of. Stick around and put your two cents in then.
cynical|12.29.10 @ 12:58PM|#
I thought that was a sarcastic reference to the fact they had a few book reviews here in the past week or so.
Dave|12.29.10 @ 1:01PM|#
Who appointed you censor?
steve|12.29.10 @ 1:12PM|#
My mistake. Great article! I look forward to the celebrity gossip column in 2011!
dhex|12.29.10 @ 1:16PM|#
this would make a lick of sense if reason wasn't always heavy on the culture tip. have you ever read the back half of the magazine?
steve|12.29.10 @ 1:27PM|#
No, .com only. My mistake again. Now I'm off to find political articles posted on people.com
liamandme|12.29.10 @ 2:47PM|#
So you recognize that you're wrong, yet you insist on being an asshole? You're just the worst kind of person.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:41PM|#
Where did all you jack off trolls come from?
steve|12.29.10 @ 3:48PM|#
That's sarcasm douchbag. I don't think I need tenure here in the comments section or subscription to "the magazine" to give an opinion as to content of the site. Lighten the hell up.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:52PM|#
My comment was not for you.
steve|12.29.10 @ 3:54PM|#
ditto
steve, or maybe Realist|12.29.10 @ 4:29PM|#
We're all confused. Douche.
Portland Dentist|9.16.11 @ 5:30PM|#
I likey
nobody|12.29.10 @ 12:34PM|#
Saw it at the Philly Film Festival. My favorite movie of the year.
Josh|12.29.10 @ 12:39PM|#
You guys are crazy. I'm really enjoying Loder's movie reviews. Good stuff. Must everything published on this site be expressly about politics? Sheesh!
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:43PM|#
It should have something to do with reason! Get it???
|12.29.10 @ 4:16PM|#
Please tell us more about what things H&R should and shouldn't have. Wait, let me get my notebook so I can write this important information down. OK, go.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 9:24PM|#
Because you call it H&R does not change the fact that it is "REASON" that staffs it.
Mark|12.29.10 @ 12:46PM|#
Thank you for the review. I'm looking forward to seeing this film.
Tim|12.29.10 @ 12:48PM|#
One look at the photo and I can tell the whole plot of the film. Blecch, as they say at Mad Magazine.
The Other Kevin|12.29.10 @ 12:55PM|#
Considering this is the only site I check regularly during the day, I appreciate the variety. I like to keep up to date on news and politics, but it is nice to have a few more topics of conversation handy.
So thanks for the review.
Realist|12.29.10 @ 3:46PM|#
All these names are new here. This is just the "REASON" people trying to cover their ass.
|12.29.10 @ 4:17PM|#
IT'S A FUCKING CONSPIRACY! MOVIE REVIEWS ARE UNREASONABLE ABOMINATIONS!!111
Realist|12.29.10 @ 9:31PM|#
All caps? That tells me a lot about the education of the population, particularly at Brandeis!
Knutsack|12.30.10 @ 12:39AM|#
Man, you are great, Realist. Your comment was so sweet, I actually thought you believed that heller was using all caps because he is dumb. That is what you were doing, right? Being ironic...or something like that?
By the way, what do you think that 111 at the end means? Is that some kind of secret Brandeis code?
Realist|12.30.10 @ 11:17AM|#
You picked the right name!
sunny black|12.30.10 @ 1:12PM|#
rough day at the office their champ? wanna talk about it?
how about movie reviews establish whether or not it is REASONable to see the film? or whether the film embodies characteristics of REASONability? did Kurt Loder give me a REASON to see this film?
your arguments are null and void. delete all your comments at once.
San jose Massage|9.16.11 @ 5:32PM|#
Hahahah you got that right!
Tim|12.29.10 @ 12:59PM|#
Kurt Loder is great, it's that sock cucking Michelle Williams I despise.
Houston Landscaping|9.16.11 @ 5:31PM|#
Agreed!
|12.29.10 @ 1:00PM|#
On a sliding scale, is this better or worse than that Tron movie he liked?
Dave|12.29.10 @ 1:07PM|#
Good review. But there's no mystery here, it sounds like she's a completely f'd up evil rhymes with witch skank who doesn't deserve somebody decent. And he still loves her because she's f'ing hot.
Looks like a good film but may be a dreary reminder of reality.
SFC B|12.29.10 @ 1:38PM|#
I don't need the story of my divorce put onto the big screen and starting people better looking than me.
Fuck yeah! |12.29.10 @ 1:08PM|#
Had to.
SIV|12.29.10 @ 1:16PM|#
Looks like an "edgy" chick flick.
Enjoy it without me ladies.
Tim|12.29.10 @ 1:29PM|#
Yeah, this has "date movie" written all over it.
zoltan|12.29.10 @ 2:57PM|#
Meaning your mother and sisters.
PIL|12.29.10 @ 1:27PM|#
There's nothing wrong with an NC-17 rating, some movies were meant to have that rating and the rating boards are subjective yet it's not a question of government interference so who really cares? We should simply encourage AMC, Muvico, and all the other chains to show NC-17 movies.
http://libertarians4freedom.bl.....tween.html
Fluffy|12.29.10 @ 1:47PM|#
Reading this review made me want to go rent Avatar again.
I hope it doesn't have a soundtrack. My wife only just recently stopped playing the soundtrack to that movie Once.
|12.29.10 @ 5:21PM|#
Gosling sings in the trailer. It's not a pretty experience.
CrackertyAssCracker|12.29.10 @ 1:48PM|#
This review almost makes me want to see this movie. Pretty impressive for an obvious chick flick.
Rock Action |12.29.10 @ 1:54PM|#
Um, I think we just got the zeitgeist without having to endure two hours of frustrated virility in the face of bureaucratic monstrosity.
zoltan|12.29.10 @ 2:37PM|#
Romantic movies about weaklings bore me.
|12.29.10 @ 4:30PM|#
I'll just assume that your children are numerous and belligerent, and your job as a newscaster is going well.
|12.29.10 @ 3:44PM|#
Of course he couldn't have her, in what sense would she be marrying up if she stayed with him?
|12.29.10 @ 9:11PM|#
What kind of car did he drive? He should have bought a porsche.
|1.1.11 @ 11:56AM|#
I just wanna know if it's boy-on-girl oral sex, or vice versa.
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