Grade: A
Starring: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Carrie Coon, Kim
Dickens, Neil Patrick Harris, Patrick Fugit, Tyler Perry and Missi Pyle
Premise; A down-on-his-luck author’s wife suddenly
disappears from a house showing signs of a violent struggle. As details of the
couple’s fractured marriage come to light, many are quick to jump to the
conclusion that the man is a killer. But all is not what it seems.
Rated R for language (including some sexual references),
violence, blood and other disturbing images, sexuality and some graphic nudity
Rarely has a movie been so repulsive and so magnetic at
once. Gone Girl, the new thriller
from Director David Fincher (auteur of other gut-punches like The Social Network, Se7en, Panic Room,
and the English-language Girl with the Dragon
Tattoo) is a hideous, terrifying, ugly, perverse, twisted film about how
false facades, faded hopes and fierce pride can tear people apart. Based on a
bestselling novel of the same name by Gillian Flynn (who also wrote the
screenplay), Gone Girl is an absolute
jaw-dropper, a shocking yet amazing film that is almost as sensational as the
sensationalism it depicts running rampant through a region gripped by an
apparent small-town crime. I knew it had already impressed at the box office,
sparked talks of potential Oscar nominations, and become a must-see-to-believe
moviegoing venture in the vein of The
Sixth Sense, The Usual Suspects and The
Crying Game, but I wasn’t quite expecting that.
It will take some time to stop tasting the bile this movie
caused me to generate. That said, I can’t deny that, in some ways, the bile
tastes pretty sweet.
Plot
It’s not really worth talking about the plot, because the
ride is crazy-brilliant, but the basics are simple enough. At a little hamlet in
Missouri, a bored, depressed former author, Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck), comes home
from a mid-morning journey downtown to find his front door open, his living
room coffee table shattered, signs of blood in his kitchen, and his gorgeous
big-city wife, Amy (Rosamund Pike), missing. Of course, the police are soon
involved, and detectives Rhonda Boney (Kim Dickens) and Jim Gilpin (Patrick
Fugit) each quickly suspect that the calm-bordering-on-indifferent Nick is
hiding something, quite possibly the murder of a woman it’s soon clear he
barely actually knew. He didn’t know she kept a journal. He didn’t know if she
had any friends in town. He didn’t know she knew about his affair with a
barely-legal former writing student of his (Emily Ratajkowski). Because Amy was
the inspiration for a best-selling children’s books series—Amazing Amy, penned by her forbidding, hoity-toity parents—the case
of her disappearance quickly becomes a national phenomenon, with notable
television personalities (Missi Pyle, Sela Ward) and know-it-all neighbors (Casey
Wilson) eager to give their two cents as to why Nick is obviously guilty, why
he should be given the death penalty, never mind prison. While many want to
believe the case is open and shut, a desperate Nick, his unfailingly loyal twin
sister (Carrie Coon) and acquired big-city lawyer Tanner Bolt (Tyler Perry)
slowly begin to find clues indicating Amy might not be dead. In fact, she might
not even be under duress. But her found journal contains nothing but paranoia, accusations,
dread, and fear. It also says “This man (my husband) may murder me.”
What Works?
For those who admire editing, pacing, and direction, Gone Girl is something close to
Christmas morning. David Fincher allows the film to build slowly, with an
opening narration of a man wondering what it would be liked to split his wife’s
skull—plus curiously-restrained performances in the early going—making it
clear something is afoot. Just what isn’t revealed until later, when the film
has gathered the dramatic momentum of a train racing downhill. Gone Girl features twists, turns, and
sad truths so effective you sometimes want to leave the theater, but I dare
anyone to walk out without knowing the full story. And this full story will
leave you agape. Unlike most movies in which the cut to a sustained black
screen lets people slowly realize the movie is, indeed, over, Gone Girl’s credits begin immediately,
the scrolling words hitting the clenched audience like a slap in the face. It’s
then that you realize this movie—a white knuckle exercise for nearly all of its
2.5 hours—is going to haunt you almost beyond words with its dicey resolution.
The cast is great, with characters effectively etched
without the actors ever being too flashy. Recently celebrated for his
directorial efforts like The Town and
Argo, Ben Affleck essentially plays
himself, but darker—a tall, charming, handsome American man, but one whose
tense tendencies suggest a constant internal storm of bitterness and regret.
Nick seems suspicious, but, despite his obvious flaws, you can’t help but be
drawn to his side. That’s mainly because his romantic foil (a phrase that is a hopelessly flimsy attempt
to describe the part), the gorgeous but frosty, impassive Rosamund Pike, looms
over the picture as an increasingly-nightmarish figure. Her scenes in flashback
suggest a woman who went into her union with Nick with her eyes open, but
needed everything to be perfect for her to be satisfied. When it’s not perfect,
she starts to fall apart, and it shows. Pike (whose resume includes a Bond girl
and a Jane Austen heroine) is dynamite in the role, a likely slam-dunk for a
Best Actress Oscar nomination. The two are ably supported by the likes of Coon
as Nick’s tortured twin sister, who sees absolutely all her brother’s warts and stands by him anyway, Dickens as the
blunt detective, and Perry as the cocky celebrity lawyer.
It’s hard to gush more about Gone Girl without allowing spoilers. As I’ve already said a couple times, what makes the movie so impressive is that it’s so enthralling despite the repulsiveness of some of its material. The movie’s most interested in revealing the thoughts that nestle into the corners of the mind, even between spouses in a marriage—it shows all fifty shades of the “do you really know them” question, including a few shades no one would ever want to admit to (needless to say, almost any couple that goes to this movie will feel a little rattled, and perhaps in need of a heart-to-heart chat or six). From the acting, to the editing, to the film’s two most memorable images (a murder most foul the audience can see coming from miles away but can do nothing but sit helplessly by and watch, and a screaming fit shown from beyond a glass window, so only the visual agony can make an impression), Girl is mesmerizing.
What Doesn’t Work?
Gone Girl is long
and feels long, but this hardly matters, as you’re anxious for the movie to
keep going until it comes to the conclusion you want to see. Whether it ever gets
there, though, is the question. Needless to say, its themes are pitch black, so
it’s not a movie that will leave you feeling cheerful. But looked at as the
movie that it is, it’s hard to quibble with.
Content
Language. Sexuality. Some nudity. Blood. A bloody murder.
Domestic squabbles. Gone Girl is full
to the brim, plus it’s so dark overall it’s not an easy movie to recommend.
Bottom Line
I feel like I can’t write a very complete review of Gone Girl because A) This is not a movie
for which anyone should want to issue or be issued spoilers, and B) the movie
itself isn’t very complete; its open-endedness is part of what makes it so
haunting. It’s well-acted, well-directed, very well-written, and it will spook
the crap out of you, especially if you’re on a date. Even if you're not,
consider this a spectacle you have to see to believe. Remember Se7en? The Usual Suspects? The Sixth Sense? The Crying Game? Movies you just
HAD to see because of their sheer audacity? Here’s another.
Gone Girl (2014)
Directed by David FincherWritten for the Screen by Gillian Flynn; Based on her Novel
Rated R
Length: 149 minutes
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