Day 13 - 01/13/2019

  Gone Girl is the pinnacle of a flawless thriller, that is, if the desire to have such an unexpected ending wasn't overlooked by all the details and investigations that were carried out through the first half of the movie. It shows a case of unpredictability that goes too far. Not necessarily being all over the place, but simply ignoring all the logic made by the rebuilding of the scene. 

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  Initially, Gone Girl is all about knowing what happened to the wife of Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck), Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike). The scene is set at his house of an apparent kidnap, with broken glass and blood stains poorly washed. When being inquired by Detective Rhonda Boney (Kim Dickens), he appears to be disinterested and unmotivated about her disappearance; their marriage wasn't going well and he appears exhausted all along. Eventually, as the investigation goes further, all signs point against Nick, making even his closest relatives wonder about his actual doings.

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  The best thing that can be said to even attempt to evaluate this film is: David Fincher delivers it again. Sure, not at the groundbreaking level of Se7en or Fight Club, but nevertheless it stands as an amazing piece by itself. Graphically stunning, surprising oddly timed climax, well built character interactions (especially between Nick and Amy and Nick and Detective Rhonda) and believable motivations for the most part are just a few of the qualities that can be attributed to almost 2.5 hours of a movie. Other honorable mentions is the screenplay, where Gillian Flynn transforms every single scene into something fresh and motivating, and both Rosamund Pike's and Kim Dickens' acting, being by far the two best onscreen performers. 

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  As cited before, unfortunately the flaws can't be overlooked. Despite Kim Dickens' outstanding performance as Detective Rhonda, as being both an objective and sympathetic investigator, her work was thrown aside and simply ignored by the obsessive media, wanting to build a strong narrative at any cost. Though something similar could happen in real life, it definitely wouldn't be strong enough to basically make her work be ignored by all the public. As if having her clues unsupported wasn't enough, Amy herself reports that the security cameras of her ex-husband (Neil Patrick Harris) captured the scene of him raping her, which could be quite believable, though incoherent to her narrative that he was somehow torturing her as the footage would disclaim. Another bothering con is that Amy Dunne's motivation isn't well understood. It can very well be explained by a psychopathic behavior but it is definitely inconvenient that Nick didn't find any clues through his marriage. The fact that she would rather go through her risky adventure of condemning him for her disappearance and get him most likely murdered due to the death penalty, rather than simply divorcing is baffling to say the least. Finally, though Neil Patrick Harris can deliver the successful charming man that he represents in Gone Girl and How I Met Your Mother, it definitely leaves me wondering if he can act something other than that. 

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  All things considered, this is something that can be seen as very close to a masterpiece, if it hadn't been for the few, though quite big, contradictions. If the usage of Dickens' character had been valued a bit more and maybe given some extra screen time on the second half of the movie to add an extra flavor to the mystery, it might've just hit the standards of Fincher's past works. Regardless, Gone Girl is definitely an ambitious thriller that mainly succeeds in its mission and deserves the full 7.8 stones out of 10, an enjoyable watch.