Blue Valentine

When Dean (Ryan Gosling) and Cindy (Michelle Williams) meet, the sky is full of violins for them. Romantic declarations of love and wild passion define the daily lives of their young happiness. Six years later, not much of that is left. Now their marriage is dominated by quarrels and mutual recriminations. Suffering is the common daughter Frankie (Faith Wladyka), who seems to be the only reason why Dean and Cindy have not yet completely abandoned their marriage. But the return of love and tenderness now seems impossible.

Many films before Blue Valentine have told of the birth and death of a great love. Most recently, for example, the drama Times of Trouble with Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio. Whereas the latter was able to break up the extremely depressing events with a little humour, Derek Cianfrance's film, which was celebrated at the renowned Sundance Film Festival, is dominated by tristesse. There is suffering for all it's worth. There is hardly any hope and romance only exists in the moments when the two main characters remember the beginning of their love. But since the viewer knows by then that this love has no future, there is also a very big heaviness over these rather light moments.

And so Blue Valentine is also hard to recommend. But there is - besides the very realistic script - another good reason to watch this movie, even if it certainly can't be categorized as feel-good cinema. This reason are the two main actors, who deliver a great performance. Michelle Williams in particular, who received her second Oscar nomination to date for her performance, shines with a performance that is hard to beat in terms of intensity, allowing the viewer to experience the pain and frustration of Cindy.

Blue Valentine is one of the most consistently anti-love films ever made. Admittedly, the many quarrels between the protagonists make the film very unwieldy and heavy fare, and many viewers might even find the whole thing tedious and boring. But even if this is justified in a certain way, the movie with its realism and especially with its great actors is also a gripping and moving work. If you can get into the melancholy production, you will then realize that. Worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp