Perdida

Two movies for the price of one.

That's a fairly glib start to a review of a movie that I really liked, but it is true. The first half of Gone Girl is a fairly standard "did he or didn't he" mystery thriller. Then, about an hour in, the perspective shifts entirely and suddenly you realise that you're watching – perhaps – the most pitch-black comedy that you've ever seen.

Despite the abrupt shift, I still think that Gone Girl holds together extremely well as one whole movie. Ben Affleck's Nick manages to inspire sympathy without ever being truly likable while Rosamund Pike's Amy (the star of the show in my opinion) is brilliant, terrifying, hilarious and despicable in various combinations and occasionally all at the same time.

David Fincher's direction is both classy and clever (as usual) and several scenes are particularly outstanding due at least as much to his brilliance as that of the actors involved in them. My one complaint would be over the length – it really didn't need to be two and a quarter hours long. There were certainly a few moments, particularly in the first half, when I wished that the movie would hurry up and get to the point just a little more quickly.

Gone Girl is a movie unlike any that I've ever seen before and as such largely defies further description. I would recommend this movie to all (with a warning that the adult rating is well earned) but especially those with a dark sense of humour. The darker the better.

This film wasn't as bad as some people say it was. It was actually good. It was a pretty nice psycho thriller. It had me guessing at times and there really weren't any dull moments. This film was well done with just enough suspense to keep me interested. The acting in this film was great as well. Now, I'm not a big fan of Tyler Perry's films but his acting is good. He had a wonderful performance in this film playing Tannor Bolt, Nick Dunne's (Ben Affleck) lawyer. He was really perfect for the part. For me it was kind of weird seeing Neil Patrick Harris playing a serious roll as the crazy ex boy friend of Nick Dunne's (Ben Affleck) wife, Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike). Rosamund Pike and the parts she were in were well done! I mean she pulled that roll off! Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike) was allegedly killed by her husband Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck). From the beginning Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) is the suspect and the craziness starts from there. If you like mysteries/thrillers you won't be disappointed with this one.

There's no denying that this is a great film and from what I've heard a great book as well, you can see that I gave it a 9/10 rating, but there's a catch especially for me personally with this movie. The shorts version I can tell you and with my hand to God no lie this movie single handedly put the nail in the coffin for my marriage without me even being the wiser. So for as much as I do appreciate the detailed and intriguing story, watching it years later after my divorce it sends chills through my body knowing that my ex wife and I enjoyed this movie together, and obviously me not knowing just how much she loved it but how it inspired her to go about divorcing me in the way that she did, be weary because there are sick people (men and women) in this world that will vindictively assassinate someone else's character and well being just to avenge whatever perversion that they're transfixed on in their own mind. I'm not looking for sympathy or anything, I'm just stating a fact that happened to me, I don't advise watching this for the first time with a love partner, it could unhinge the mind beyond a point of no return, I'm absolutely 100% serious about this, this is not a joke.

I'm not one for reviews, but I tremendously enjoyed this film but felt empty at the end of it. That ending was shockingly bad, such a let down to a great film. Still worth watching but you will end up cursing the writers, producers and perhaps even the actors for that low quality ending. Even if the story was written to end this way, it could have been communicated far better and with far more realistic excitement. It seems like they just plonked it at the end rather than continue the story. What the hell happened? Did they run out of time or needed to release it by a specific date or did the original scriptwriter run off? The end the film was not of the same quality of the rest of the film and left me feeling shortchanged.

Amy and Nick Dunne are young, stylish and charming. The immaculate dream couple? It seems so, at least on the face of it. But infidelity and financial troubles let the glamorous façade crumble. One morning, Amy disappears without a trace, and Nick becomes suspect. Did he kill his wife? The media depict him as an uncaring husband, and he's trying desperately to correct that image. But what if he really is the murderer everyone believes him to be?

"Gone Girl", based on the Gillian Flynn novel of the same name, is a masterful thriller, a sharp-sighted media satire and a cynical analysis of modern marriage. Flynn herself wrote the screenplay for the movie adaptation, and David Fincher turns the already disturbing story into something even darker. "Gone Girl" is a perfect fit for Fincher, as it is concerned with two of his favorite themes: gender issues and modern media. The main topic here is how the media are shaping our own identities. Nick Dunne has to adapt to the expectations of the public in order to survive. As his lawyer Tanner Bolt puts it: "This case is about what people think of you."

Amy and Nick both just play a character. They pretend to be a perfect couple. The movie suggests that pretending and being are not as far apart as we tend to think. When everyone plays along, the shallow masks are going to work. The much-maligned ending underlines this insight perfidiously. It's the point where "Gone Girl" becomes a pitch-black social satire. The last act isn't a thriller anymore, it's a grotesque caricature of modern relationships. I've never seen anything like it, and I can't praise Fincher enough for the risk he took with the last half an hour of this movie.

Ben Affleck is great as the insipid husband Nick. You love to hate him. Rosamund Pike is simply mind-blowing. You'll also see Neil Patrick Harris and Tyler Perry in unusual roles. My personal favorite is Carrie Coon as Nick's caring yet foul-mouthed sister Margo. She's the heart of this movie, because unlike everyone else, she genuinely speaks her mind. Kim Dickens as the clever detective Rhonda Boney is pretty approachable, too.

"Gone Girl" might be Fincher's most splendid masterpiece yet. This movie is so unsettling and cynical, it feels like it was directed by the love child of Alfred Hitchcock and Lars von Trier. If that's not awesome, I don't know what is.