Blue Valentine (2010)

The cast of this movie is fantastic.  Ryan Gosling plays Dean with the intensity that the character deserves and requires.  Michelle Williams plays Cindy with a fragile hue that really shines in her later depiction of Marilyn Monroe in 'My Week With Marilyn' so haunting.  The front story is that this is about a relationship in decay--the scenes vacillate between when they first meet and the things that lead up to their marriage, and then the final chapters of their living together six years later.  But what it really is alcoholism, and how it can end things like conversation, partnership, planning for the future, and relationships.
Unfortunately, that is probably not everyone's take home message.  Cindy is from a working class family and she has big plans.  She is smart, she is in college and she plans to go to medical school.  That is up until the point she has somewhat consensual rough sex with a jock who may be used to ignoring 'No' and who may just not care and gets pregnant after the condom is left inside when he withdraws.
That man is clearly not father material.  Nor does she have a great of idea of what father material looks like because her father is at least verbally abusive to her mother in a way that is very painful to watch--and Cindy is still living at home in order to swing college (she is not alone--more and more college students are defraying the cost of an education by avoiding the costs of room and board--may they all not live under such a dreadful roof).  By the time Cindy figures out she is pregnant, she is flirting and sleeping with Dean--who ultimately suggests they raise this other guys' kid.  Not that this is a sure fire path to destruction of a relationship.  No--Dean is portrayed as a good father-but he is a father who gets up, has a beer, and therefore is not the soberest of all parents.   The downward spiral is painful to watch, and no one really gets away unscathed.  Compelling acting, but most definitely not a romance.