Ryan Gosling told me last night at the premiere of his new film, “The Place Beyond the Pines,” something we’ve probably all thought at one time or another: “I always wanted to ride motorcycles and rob banks.” And not to give anyone any ideas, Gosling, who does those things in “Pines,” added: “And it’s easier than you think. The banks are told to just give you the money.”

Indeed, watching Gosling knock off a bunch of rural banks in modern upstate New York with relative ease, you start to think, hey I could do that. But, again, kids, don’t try this at home.

“Pines” clocks in just under three hours and is its own kind of masterpiece. The second movie from Derek Cianfrance (“Blue Valentine”), “Pines has a unique construction. It’s multi generational and multi perspective. Ryan Gosling and Eva Mendes have the first hour or so, Bradley Cooper has the second hour, and the film finishes up with two young actors, with echoes of Gosling and Cooper.

Gosling plays a ex carnival motorcycle stuntman who discovers that a one night stand with Eva Mendes a year earlier has produced a baby boy. This sets off a series of episodes that spiral out of control. Gosling and Mendes–who became a couple in real life subsequently and still are going strong–generate a lot of heat as this never-was couple. Mendes is magnificent.

And then they are gone. Cianfrance takes a big chance and switches the story to that of a cop played by Bradley Cooper who pursues Gosling. It’s a gamble because the audience has followed this story with a huge investment. But Cooper is more than enough of an actor to meet the challenge. And so you have two of the biggest movie star-actor names as tentpoles for this unusual story as “Pines” changes perspective. Cooper’s path plays out from the consequences of his meeting Gosling, and still the story is of people whose lives spiral out of control from a single event.

There’s a third part to “Pines” too as the teenaged sons of Gosling’s and Cooper’s characters resolve the story. “Pines”– the title is the Indian translation of the word “Schenectady”–the upstate New York town where this was shot–is like a great novel that unfolds on screen in its own time.

Representatives from all the big distributors were present at this mayhem like premiere last night at the Princess of Wales Theater. Everyone wants it. Whoever gets it I hope will not try to force it into theatres for this Oscar season but give it a chance next spring. “Pines” could be a big, big deal. But it’s also a big, big meal of a movie.

As for Gosling, I asked him at the swell party following the screening — to which he naturally brought his family and where he and Mendes mingled with Kristin Wiig, co-star Cooper, and the stars’ endless admirers–what he thought of all the internet send ups of him, and his now-sort of invented way of saying “Hey girl” in movies. (I think his first acknowledgment of Mendes in “Pines” is actually the word Hey.)

Does it seem weird to him?

“How could it not?” Gosling laughed. “I know about it but you can’t think about it.” He shook his head. Fame and the internet are very strange companions. “The Place Beyond the Pines,” however, is a major film.

I could just about cry. DA Pennebaker, the legendary filmmaker and my friend, has been chosen to receive an honorary Oscar. He’s the first documentary filmmaker to win a Lifetime Achievement Oscar. He’s among four industry insiders who will get one including Jeffrey Katzenberg (for his incredible charity work), Hal Needham and George Stevens. No actors were chosen this year– no Doris Day or other icon. But Pennebaker– is a big, big deal. With a handful of other men he invented Cinema Verite, which is now, sadly, perverted into reality TV and “documentary” type shows.

But Pennebaker’s work with Ricky Leacock and Al and David Maysles and a few others invented the kind of fly on the wall filmmaking this is alternately thought of as cinema verite or just documentary. Also for the last 30 years he’s been working with his wife, the award winning filmmaker Chris Hegedus. All together his films range from “Dont Look Back” and “Monterey Pop”– the two best and most important music films of the 60s — to “The War Room” (Oscar nominee about the 1992 Clinton campaign), and a film I was lucky to make with them in 2002 called “Only the Strong Survive.”

It was Pennebaker’s early work, and his access to political figures like Robert Kennedy, that put him on the map. Pennebaker et al made fly-on-the-wall films at the Kennedy White House, and on the campaign trail, that created a whole world that didn’t exist before. Pennebaker, who’s 86 and has eight children, is also a huge music fan–mostly jazz and Broadway, and soul. He (with and without Chris) has made films about Elaine Stritch, Depeche Mode, and Chuck Berry and Little Richard among others. His filming of the recording of the Stephen Sondheim musical, “Company,” is almost what made Sondheim, Stritch and everyone else involved. It’s a classic.

And then there are the collaborations. With Frazer Pennebaker, Wendy Ettinger, and RJ Cutler, Chris and Penny (as he is known) made “The War Room.” I was lucky enough to do “Only the Strong Survive” with them. They made “Startup.com”–and Chris won the Directors Guild of America prize with Jehane Noujaim. And the Pennebakers made “Down from the Mountain,” a concert film from “O Brother Where Art Thou?” with the Coen Brothers in Nashville.

Since the announcement came down at 2am Eastern, I haven’t been able to speak to Penny. But I know he’s thinking of Leacock, his best pal, who passed away last year (he was in his 90s). And Maysles and a bunch of other people. If any film minded publisher is interested. Penny was interviewed for the Columbia University oral history project some time ago. A big, funny manuscript of anecdotes exists, and has just been gathering dust. It takes in 60 years of filmmaking by what is now an Oscar winning legend. And a much deserved one at that. Congratulations!

The Lifetime Achievement Oscars are handed out at a special dinner in Hollywood in November. The Motion Picture Academy is batting a thousand so far this year with announcements!

PS Kudos also to Frazer Pennebaker, eldest son of the clan, who is well known behind the scenes as producer of the Pennebaker Hegedus Films and the guy who makes the trains run on time. He doesn’t get the credit he deserves.