'Gone Girl' - Tricky plotlines, devilish twists
Like an especially zealous high school biology student prodding at the frog split open before him, the filmmaker David Fincher - a man who takes wicked delight in examining the motives, and modus operandi, of serial killers and sociopaths (see Seven, see Zodiac, see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo) - dissects the institution of marriage in his new, cannily crafted mystery, Gone Girl.
Like an especially zealous high school biology student prodding at the frog split open before him, the filmmaker David Fincher - a man who takes wicked delight in examining the motives, and modus operandi, of serial killers and sociopaths (see Seven, see Zodiac, see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo) - dissects the institution of marriage in his new, cannily crafted mystery, Gone Girl.
You may have heard of it. Gillian Flynn's book has spent 95 weeks at or near the top of the combined print and e-book lists. The casting of the film adaptation - with Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike as Nick and Amy Dunne, a couple five years into wedlock, their honeymoon decidedly over - has been the buzz of the news media, social media, book clubs, yada yada. Flynn herself wrote the screenplay, promising new zigs and zags. And Affleck, buffed and stubbled, has been all over the talk-show circuit - Matt Lauer, Jon Stewart, Jimmy Fallon, that guy with the toupee, and the webcast out of Duluth (OK, maybe not). Anticipation has been feverish.
And, well?
Well, Fincher and company have pulled it off.
Beginning with Affleck's Nick taking the garbage to the curb in the suburban McMansion he shares with his wife, and ending in a series of revelations, and retaliations, which will not be further delved into, Gone Girl presents a deft mix of whodunit and who-you-gonna-believe?
When Nick calls the police on the Dunnes' fifth anniversary - she has disappeared, leaving behind a smashed glass coffee table and rooms streaked with traces of blood - a manhunt (or womanhunt) ensues. Because she is the daughter of famous authors who used her as the model for their Amazing Amy series of children's books, her vanishing act quickly becomes fodder for the news. Volunteer searches are started; a URL, FindAmazingAmy.com, created. And Nick, the worried spouse, is at the center of it all.
Only his reaction - both in public, and to the police team led by Detective Boney (a terrific Kim Dickens) - seems off, aloof, curiously cool. When an envelope labeled "Clue One" is discovered, and later more clues, and then Amy's journal, and then an affair is found out, the focus of the search turns back to Nick: The eyewitness news teams, the cops, Amy's parents, just about everyone is ready to point an accusatory finger.
Affleck plays all of this just right. He's sympathetic but enigmatic enough that the door to doubt is left open. Maybe he is the perp, after all.
The flashbacks and voice-overs coming from Amy, and Amy's journal, certainly paint a completely different picture of their marriage. She has bankrolled the bar he opened with his sister (Carrie Coon). Amy's life insurance policy was upped. She talks about her neighbor and best friend while Nick tells the detectives she didn't really have any friends.
Gone Girl pivots and snakes through its tricky plotlines, shifting the point of view, setting us up for the Big Reveal that, in itself, is layered with surprise.
Neil Patrick Harris is an odd choice to play Desi Collins, Amy's wealthy, stalkerlike college beau. But his casting speaks to Fincher's penchant for comedy, I think, and Gone Girl, at times, plays like a dark, dark comedy, indeed. More chilling are the man and woman holed up in a motel who cross paths with one of the movie's principals; Boyd Holbrook and Lola Kirke are grungy and menacing. And Tyler Perry as Tanner Bolt, Nick's high-profile defense attorney, functions as a kind of voice of reason, if reason can be found in the midst of a media superstorm, with its rush-to-judgment TV anchors and talk-show interrogators.
Though Affleck has a delicate path to walk, Pike's portrayal of Amy is broader, with more shades (of gray, of bloodred), and the actress goes at it with a glint in her eye, and a determination that's scary. It could be argued that at a certain point in the story, Amy's actions begin to make little sense, but that's an argument land-mined with spoilers, so let's leave it at that. Otherwise, the whole devilishly twisted thing could explode.
Gone Girl *** 1/2 (Out of four stars)
Directed by David Fincher. With
Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry, Kim Dickens, Patrick Fugit. Distributed
by Twentieth Century Fox.
Running time: 2 hours, 29 mins.
Parent's guide: R (violence, sex, nudity, profanity, adult themes).
Playing at: Area theaters.EndText
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@Steven_Rea