Review: The Place Beyond the Pines

4/4

I'm just so amazed at how much I felt during this movie and how much thematic material it covered.
The film comes in three spiritual parts.
The first is about a man. He's a beautiful man. He's an outlaw who's fallen into a violent and unsettling life. But when his son comes up into his world, we see an unbelievable father. An honest man, from the core to the surface. All the way through. There are few characters, in all of film, that I have more affection or sympathy for. He's stuck in a world that hates him for his position, and can't understand who he is. But he stands strong against all forces denying him of his rights. Events happen that prove how utterly cruel the universe is. One main topic of the film is redemption, or karma. Do things come back around? Can the destruction of a great man be understood and redeemed?
The second part is about a new man. He's entangled in an organization of crookedness and corruption. Yet he is an honest man. He is fighting for justice, climbing his way up the dark crooked ladder so that he can provoke moral resolutions and add his touch of fairness to the world. He has made a mistake. A major one, but an understandable one. And he is fighting to make it right.
The third part is where everything will either come back around or remain in its dark and shadowy spiritual area. This will either be the turning point of the film, or will leave us dangling in moral question. The third part involves two consequences. Both are lost souls, but one is searching for redemption.
One incredible thing that this movie does is make us love the outlaw, then love the man of law that destroys him, then love the new outlaw that destroys the man of law. What an UNBELIEVABLE scheme. The characters here are so rich and thickly layered. They are brutally good and honest men. It is both beautiful to watch them and feel for them, and torturous. I connected with each of the three mains to such a level that I want to watch this movie over and over so that I might begin to live in it. Maybe I can live their stories and experience their love, loss and righteousness. I am encapsulated in a world of mildness, materialism, emptiness of soul. The realness of The Place Beyond the Pines hurts me with longing. I want not the perfection that I have, but rather the destruction and strong, solid, true-to-heart moral actions and consequences of this film. I doubt I have ever felt such things for a film.
Each part has its own mood and meaning. You must be able to look under the surface, beneath the faces of each character. You must be able to sink into the tone of the music, and feel the motivations behind each action. This is what I could not do when I watched it a year or so ago. Immerse yourself in this world and you will have an experience you have rarely had in the movies. Derek Cianfrance's sophomore work needs a deeper look. I did not catch it on the first viewing, not in the slightest. But now I appreciate this film for all that it is. Its trueness overwhelmed me.
Many critics called the road of this film long and winding. I felt that the first time. This time, not only did I not want it to end, I wanted to exist in it forever. This film made me feel what's missing in my life.

This is what I am ultimately taught: be real to yourself. Do what you need to do. Don't pay mind to what others expect from you.
I want to exit my world and enter that one. So badly.
Derek Cianfrance took me away with his first film. He does it again here.