David Fincher’s Gone Girl (2014) Movie Review

“Fincher done it again…”

Fresh after reading the book, I expected the film to be no less, and this was almost perfect. Gone Girl stays true to the book, but takes few negligible deviations, which don’t hamper the overall experience in anyway. Auteur David Fincher loves crime and good adaptation, so a book about missing girl and a husband who may done nothing terrible seems like a perfect match for the director.

The film opens with Nick (Ben Affleck), after taking in a couple of later morning rounds in the bar, he co-owns with his sister Margo (Carrie Coon). He arrives to find evidence that Amy (Rosamund Pike) appears to be abducted, if not worse. He notifies police, alerts everyone, and begins navigating treacherous waters of being a man under suspicion of possibly having killed his wife. His life becomes a centre ring in a scrutiny circus, with police, public and press investigating the mystery from every direction. It is not long before evidence and information about the state of the relationship lead suspicious eyes to be cast upon Nick.

Every situation lead characters find them in is terrifying, spooky, and wrapped in a heavy layer of suspense. Every character is layered with unpredictability, and delimitation is crazy.  Actress Rosamund Pike, man she can act. Whose work was always admired and who always have been a supporting character in films like Pride & Prejudice and more recent in The World’s End. Pike exceeds expectations’ as the gorgeous blonde who goes missing. The chemistry between Affleck and Pike is intensely real. Ben Affleck is more than convincing with his dark and bewildering poetrayal of Nick Dunne, the good-looking yet narcissistic husband who is beside himself when his wife goes missing. Carrie Coon is lovely as Affleck’s caring sister. Tyler Perry has a fun supporting role as a lawyer who takes Nick’s case immediately. Casey Wilson, Scoot McNairy have invigorating cameos.

Gone Girl marks David Fincher’s tenth film and along with Gillian Flynn, has managed to keep us off balance right from the start. He is impeccable in his execution of this seemingly slow, but fast developing script. He has added another entry to the catalogue of riveting murder mysteries. The films ending is something where Fincher missteps. Director and editor Kirk Baxter use alternating timelines for the great effect, more than once cutting happy moment from the past to the dim present day, effectively creates collocation. But the final act is not so effective at using this structure to create doubt. There are contradictions between how Nick describes things and how Amy wrote them, but that is the nature of humanity, every person’s unique position yields a different view of events. While everything that happens in the entire film requires suspension of disbelief,that is easily given, even within that context the ending strains trustfulness. It neither makes nor breaks the film, to which it belongs, and in this case truth is revealed and moral lines drawn are sort of vile.

The musical score always drives David Fincher’s films have always been a driving force, acting like a leading character in many ways, and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross score in Gone Girl is no different. The music is obsessing, beautiful & acute, very much similar to our characters in the film. Cinematography contribute a lot to the brooding mood of the film. The makers have used all their resources in the best way possible.

So where does that leave us now? Finished the book less than 48 hours before a screening of this 149 minutes film; I’m not sure either needed to be quite so long, but I had a good time anyway. Initially thought it’s going to have the same effect as Prisoners (2013). But damn this was something different. It made me had a lot of thinking even after watching it. I recommend everyone to watch it.

Survi Review: 3.5/5

Theatrical Trailer: