When I learned that The Place Beyond the Pines was directed and co-written by Derek Cianfrance, the same gentleman who brought us 2010’s Blue Valentine, I predicted that one of two possible outcomes would transpire.

#1: I would leave the theatre just as depressed as I did after Blue Valentine. To be honest, for all of its (successful) efforts to depict the disintegration of a relationship, all it left me wanting to do was go home, eat chocolate, and never date again out of fear that I would end up like Cindy (Michelle Williams) and Dean (Ryan Gosling).

#2: Based on casting and the trailer alone, I projected that the movie would be a tour-de-force of dramatically epic proportions. Granted, that may seem like an extreme exaggeration; but to my defense, I have still been riding the high of Silver Linings Playbook, my favorite flick of 2012. I was expecting a lot from a film that included not just Bradley Cooper, but also Ryan Gosling.

As is turns out, I am not a clairvoyant, and neither of my predictions was accurate. Instead, what The Place Beyond the Pines delivered was an intriguing start, a middle with some serious build-up, and an unfortunately anti-climactic ending. I left the theatre feeling like I caught the gist of the life lessons Cianfrance and co-writers Ben Coccio and Darius Marder were trying to convey (the movie was about the choices we make as men/women and the repercussions of those choices on the generations that follow…right?), but they never really seemed to get to the point. I waited all one-hundred and forty minutes for the big speech, the big lashing, the big blow-out. It never came. I was left hanging with a slew of emotions about the characters and their stories and never granted a resolution. Was this supposed to be a reflection of life, too? Perhaps, but I think now we’re getting too deep for a movie review.

The Place Beyond the Pines begins by telling the story of Luke Glanton (Gosling), a motorcycle stuntman touring with a traveling state fair act. While on a stop-over in Schenectady, New York (which is actually the Mohawk word for “a place beyond the pine plains”), he finds out that Romina (Eva Mendes), a girl he once spent the night with on a previous tour, has given birth to their son. Determined to be a part of the child’s life, Luke quits the traveling act to stick around town. Met with a lot of resistance from Romina and her live-in boyfriend Kofi (Mahershala Ali), Luke decides that the only way he will be able to make real money and get the family he so badly wants to create, is to rob banks and use his motorcycle as the getaway vehicle. And therein begins the “ride” of the movie.

Though the story line felt unfinished, the acting did not falter. Gosling did what he does best. Whether delivering a happy or sad line, he has a knack for expressing every emotion with subtlety, never taking things any further then they should be. Cooper also had no problem demonstrating the struggle Avery was experiencing in being a good cop versus bad cop, and dealing with the outcome of his actions. The true surprise in The Place Beyond the Pines was Mendes, who until now has been limited to playing the arm candy in various romantic comedies/comedies. As Romina, Mendes gave us a genuine depiction of a mother who can’t figure out what the best fate for her child would be—letting a volatile character like the birth father into their lives, or sticking with the safer-bet boyfriend. To add to that, the actors who play Luke’s crime-conspirator Robin (Ben Mendelsohn) and teenage son Jason (Dane DeHaan) do so convincingly and with depth. Throughout the movie, you can truly feel the internal conflict going on in each one of these character’s lives: what is right/wrong? How can I do what is right for my family?

The trailer will have you believing that the story revolves around the clash between good (Avery the Cop) and evil (Luke the Bank Robber). Don’t let it fool you. Gosling’s and Cooper’s onscreen time together is actually limited to about 1 minute. What unfolds because of that is a story that is multi-dimensional and left me wanting more. Though that may seem like a good thing, my (faulty) prediction abilities don’t anticipate a sequel. So, all in all, I could have used a more concrete ending. However, if you love Ryan Gosling and Bradley Cooper as much as I do, go see the movie. They do not disappoint.