Seeing this truth openly presented in this format gave me the validation I needed to help relieve some of my own long harboured guilt and injury.

Its rare indeed to see this frame of male dupe and covert female subjugator portrayed in such an intelligent manner. The phenomena of malevolent female is very real and yet so often resists challenge. Men are almost always believed to be somehow guilty by association when caught in such toxic relationships.

Blue Valentines narrative is structured in a non linear fashion and the consequences of various aspects of the film are cleverly disguised until we have travelled part way through the plot.

The couple meet when Goslings character Dean happens to catch site of Cindy, Williams’s character while she is visiting her grandmother at a care home and he is delivering furniture for a removals company. As a hopeless romantic who, literally wears his heart on his sleeve, he falls for Cindy immediately.

I’m fairly certain that Dean is an INFJ, but I’m not too sure about Cindy’s type. ISFP maybe?

As the film develops we revisit the couple at various points in their relationship before and after they are married. The way this is done is so masterful that to begin with we only perceive the relationship from the perspective of a misinformed public. Genius. And only later do we piece the proper narrative together.

You really couldn’t ask for better onscreen chemistry than we get here between Gosling and Williams. The qualities of their acting chops are so well synchronised that together they create a poetic dynamic that sings.

I don’t want to delve too deeply into the plot, but suffice to say there is so much in this film to praise, let alone its ability to exist. Every scene in the movie reveals layers of psychological analysis through subtle hints and circumstantial connections. We get to understand what kind of external forces conspired to mould these two tragic individuals and how they sustain each others suffering through shared immaturity and misguided intentions.

This is however a win lose relationship and the true tragedy of this story is seeing the love that Dean has devoted to Cindy being retracted from him along with his young daughter. This is a real Red Pill realisation that is harrowing to watch.