9.5/10

Absolutely the most powerful film of 2013 so far. Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper deserve Oscars for performances that are definitely the best thing that either one of them have ever done. I will try to review this without spoiling anything. This movie is awesome because it has so much balls to do something ultra shocking in the first 1/3 of the film. After that it turns into a story that crosses the characters interactions so well that it becomes that kind of film on the likes of ‘Crash’. This movie had beautiful cinematography in the way it was shot and edited. It takes a yuppie town and really makes something beautiful out of it. The woods itself was a character in this movie. The score is also not disappointing as it compliments a jump in the story 15 years ahead and gives music for that time. The only problem i really had with this film was the running time of 2 hours and 20 minutes. While i totally understand why the film was this long as they had to build up the big payoffs they were giving by the end, i do think that an average movie fan will be bored by the 2 hour mark. It kept me pretty well entertained, but i can see both sides of the ball on that one. The biggest thing i got from this movie was the fact that it may be better if we don’t know everything about our pasts. Sometimes they will come back to haunt. I recommend this film to anyone who digs powerful performances and deep impacting situations.