Lives keep bouncing off each other, every choice threatening those left standing, in the staggering The Place Beyond The Pines. Ryan Gosling offers yet another brilliant performance, this time playing a shade of his character from Drive—a talented motorcyclist filled with violence who begins robbing banks to provide for the infant son he didn't know he had. Bradley Cooper continues a surprisingly successful dramatic turn as a rookie cop with a powerful father, struggling with corruption on the force. It's Emory Cohen and Dane DeHaan who steal the show, though, playing troubled teens from different sides of the same town. The two spiralling around each other breaks from a reflective character study, growing Pines into an epic story of right, wrong and family. Director Derek Cianfrance, who previously crafted the intimate Blue Valentine, shows a formidable growth here. Haunting, stoic and impossible to forget.