Blue Valentine (film)

Blue Valentine
Promotional poster
Directed by	Derek Cianfrance
Produced by	Lynette Howell Alex Orlovsky Jamie Patricof Executive: Doug Dey Jack Lechner Scott Osman Ryan Gosling Michelle Williams
Written by	Derek Cianfrance Cami Delavigne Joey Curtis
Starring	Ryan Gosling Michelle Williams
Music by	Grizzly Bear
Cinematography	Andrij Parekh
Editing by	Jim Helton Ron Patane
Studio	Hunting Lane Films Silverwood Films
Distributed by	The Weinstein Company
Release dates	January 24, 2010 (2010-01-24) (Sundance) December 29, 2010 (2010-12-29) (United States)
Running time	112 minutes[1]
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$1 million[2]
Box office	$12,355,734[2]

Blue Valentine is a 2010 American romantic drama film written and directed by Derek Cianfrance. The film premiered in competition at the 26th Sundance Film Festival. Derek Cianfrance, Cami Delavigne, and Joey Curtis wrote the film, and Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling played the lead roles as well as serving as co-executive producers for the film. The band Grizzly Bear scored the film.

The film depicts a married couple, Dean Pereira (Gosling) and Cynthia "Cindy" Heller (Williams), shifting back and forth in time between their courtship and the dissolution of their marriage several years later.

Plot

The film starts in the present and in flashbacks looks at how Cindy and Dean come together. Dean is a young high school dropout, working for a New York City moving company. Cindy is a pre-med student living with her unhappy parents and caring for her grandmother in Pennsylvania. Cindy and Dean meet at Cindy's grandmother's nursing home while Dean is delivering a new resident's furniture. They rush into marriage after discovering that Cindy is pregnant, both knowing it is most likely from her previous boyfriend Bobby. Before the wedding, Bobby, unaware of Cindy's pregnancy, finds and beats Dean at his job.

This narrative of their courtship is intercut with that of a weekend some five years later. They live in rural Pennsylvania and Dean works at painting houses while Cindy is a nurse at a doctor's office. One evening, after the death of the family dog, Dean insists on taking Cindy to a romantic motel two hours away to "get drunk and make love". In the liquor store Cindy sees Bobby. Bobby asks Cindy if she has ever cheated on her husband and she hesitates, but says no. In the car Cindy tells Dean about seeing Bobby and Dean is upset. They argue and Cindy is overwhelmed. At the motel they argue about Dean's lack of ambition and alcohol consumption. Cindy is reluctant to make love. They get drunk and argue while attempting sex. Finally Cindy locks Dean out of the bedroom. Cindy is called away early in the morning to work at the clinic. She leaves a note for Dean.

Cindy's boss proposes having an affair to Cindy. She is offended, having thought he had respected her work.

Angry that Cindy left the motel without telling him, and leaving him stranded without a ride, Dean shows up at the clinic drunk, leading to an intense argument and violent altercation with Cindy's boss, who fires Cindy over the incident. Dean tries to persuade her to give the relationship another chance, asking if she wants their daughter to grow up in a broken home. Cindy says she does not want Frankie to grow up with parents who are so hateful to each other. Dean reminds Cindy of their wedding vows, and Cindy apologizes. She asks Dean for "a little space," and he complies: the film ends as we see him walking away from the house, with Frankie running after him to ask him to stay. Dean tells his daughter to go back to her Mom, and Dean keeps walking.^[3]

Cast

• Ryan Gosling as Dean
• Michelle Williams as Cindy
• Faith Wladyka as Frankie
• John Doman as Jerry
• Mike Vogel as Bobby
• Marshall Johnson as Marshall
• Jen Jones as Gramma

Production

Williams was 21 when she received the script and Gosling committed to the production two years later, but filming did not begin until 2009, when Williams was 29, due to Cianfrance's inability to find financing. The director was also unable to film the "young" and "older" scenes several years apart as he had hoped, again due to lack of money.^{[ 1]} The film was to be shot in California but production was moved to Brooklyn, New York and Honesdale, Pennsylvania. Williams wanted to stay close to her Brooklyn home to take care of her daughter, Matilda, so the director chose Honesdale due to its proximity to Brooklyn.

Gosling and Williams improvised dialogue; the scene in which their characters wander through New York together was unscripted, for example, with the actors—who had both appeared in The United States of Leland (2003) but had not shared scenes—getting to know each other during its filming.^[5] Before filming the marriage dissolution between the main characters, Gosling and Williams prepared by renting a home, bringing their own clothing and belongings, buying groceries with a budget based on their characters' incomes, filming home movies and taking a family portrait at a local Sears with the actress who played their daughter, and staging out arguments.^{[ 1][ 1]} Cianfrance visited the actors and assisted them in building tension while remaining in character: "One night he told Gosling to go into Williams' bedroom and try to make love to her. Gosling, soundly rejected, ended up sleeping on the couch."^[6]

The film was shot in Super 16mm and Red One. The former was used for the pre-marriage scenes and the latter was used for the post-marriage scenes.^[7]

While on the The Hollywood Reporter Director's Roundtable, Derek Cianfrance pointed out that he gave up his entire director's fee to help fund the film: "I mean, it came down to we were exactly my fee short. They paid me and I just paid it back. So I still have to pay taxes on it, you know. So I actually had to pay to make the movie."^[8]

Music

Gosling wrote and performed some songs by himself. The band Grizzly Bear composed the score of the film. A soundtrack for the film was released by Lakeshore Records.

One of the film's feature songs, "You and Me", which is presented as the couple's personal song, was originally recorded as a demo by a group called Penny & The Quarters for the obscure Prix Label of Columbus, Ohio in the early 1970s. It was re-released on a compilation album by the Numero Group in 2007 without the members of the group being identified.^[9]

Release

The film was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival^[10] and premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 15, 2010.^[11] In Australia, the film was released on December 26, 2010 through Palace Films.^[12] In the United States, it was distributed by The Weinstein Company as a limited release on December 29, 2010.^[13]

Rating controversy

On October 8, 2010 Blue Valentine was officially given an NC-17 rating by the MPAA for American cinemas. This was due to a scene depicting cunnilingus.^[14] Gosling accused the MPAA of sexism and misogyny. "There's plenty of oral sex scenes in a lot of movies, where it's a man receiving it from a woman - and they're R-rated. Ours is reversed and somehow it's perceived as pornographic", he stated.^[15][16] The Weinstein Company appealed the decision and aimed for an R without any trims to the film, believing the prior decision would significantly harm the film's potential box office take in the United States.^[17] The company's appeal was successful on December 8, 2010, and the film received the desired rating. The film was given an uncut 15 certificate from the British Board of Film Classification.^[18]

Home media

The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on May 10, 2011. Special features include an audio commentary with Director Derek Cianfrance, a making-of documentary, deleted scenes, and home movies.^[19] The film has grossed $2,625,451 through US DVD sales.^[20]

Reception

Critical response

Blue Valentine has received critical acclaim. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes reports that 88% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 180 reviews, with an average score of 7.7/10. The consensus reads "This emotionally gripping examination of a marriage on the rocks isn't always easy to watch, but Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling give performances of unusual depth and power."^[21] On Metacritic, the film has an average score of 81 out of 100, based on 42 reviews, indicating "Universal acclaim" .^[22] Roger Ebert gave it 3,5 stars, writing: “Dean seems stuck. He seems to stay fixed at the initial stage. Can you see the difference between (1) "He loves me as much as he always did," and (2) "He loves me exactly like he always did"?”^[23]

Accolades

In 2006, the script won the Chrysler Film Project, a competition that awards cash to an outstanding new feature film director overseen by Independent Feature Project.^[24]

References

External links

• Official website
• Blue Valentine at the Internet Movie Database
• Blue Valentine at Box Office Mojo
• Blue Valentine at Rotten Tomatoes
• Blue Valentine at Metacritic