Derek Cianfrance’s Blue Valentine documents both the birth and dissolution of love, and in doing so, manages to be beautifully tender and tragically heart wrenching. Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams are Dean and Cindy, a married couple with a young child, whose relationship seems to finally be hitting the wall and hard. The tragedy of their romance gone bad is made even more catastrophic by the glimpse we get of them as idealistic youths. They are two people looking for the familial love and warmth that failed them as children. Something they seem to find in each other, at least for a while.
The film is composed of moments that mirror each other constantly. One such moment has Dean telling Cindy that the life they have together is not what he asked for or wanted, a cruel sentiment, until he adds his realization that it was the life he desired once he had it. That scene takes you back to the very beginning of their courtship. Flirting on a bus, Cindy comments on Dean’s ability to insult and flatter at once. It’s a moment full of romantic possibility mirrored against one that is desperate and tinged with sadness. It also serves as an example of the disenchantment they’ve suffered while married to one another.
The things that drew them to each other, ultimately undo them, grating on the other’s sensibilities. The change in filming technique emphasizes the change in their relationship. There is a kind of ethereal quality to their romantic stage, Cindy and Dean seemingly always bathed in light, while their present is much grainier and darker. It’s the juxtaposition of scenes from their best days and worst that make the film often difficult to watch. You believe in their love, and to witness its failure forces you to grieve like an active participant of their relationship.
Williams received both Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for her portrayal of Cindy. Believable as both an optimistic young lover and a hardened, resentful wife, it’s recognition that’s well deserved. Gosling’s performance, however, had the biggest impact on me. Cianfrance develops the perfect character here. A man full of the faults his wife accuses him of, but a man you cannot help but fall in love with nonetheless. At the film’s beginning Dean tells a coworker men are more romantic, a sentiment that rings true in his character at least. Sensitive to a fault, you root for him and for his love to be strong enough for the two of them. While the film ends with no clear resolution, one has the feeling that resentment and time will prove to be too much.
Blue Valentine is available on DVD and Blu-ray now.