Gritty, riveting, and complex mystery

Rating: 9/10 (27 October 2007)

Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck's debut as a feature film director, is a finely textured and thoroughly engrossing crime drama. Showcasing brilliant performances, the film succeeds as both a captivating mystery and as a thought provoking examination of morally ambiguous issues not often encountered on a local megaplex screen.
The film is based on a novel by Dennis Lehane, author of Mystic River, and similarly focuses on the tough, crime laced neighborhoods of Boston. Instead of Clint Eastwood's stylish, almost operatic tragedy, Gone Baby Gone provides a grittier and even more complex, morally ambiguous view of life on the other side of the tracks. The cinematography by John Toll (especially the sparing and effective use of hand help camera work) and editing by William Goldenberg (most effective in weaving together multiple tracking shots and in capturing the reactions of multiple characters within a scene) visually support a sense of intimate realism. The musical score by Harry Gregson-Williams pulls the viewer into the film without overpowering it.
Ben Affleck's triumph in this film is the way in which he allows the actors, or rather, the characters they portray, to comprise the heart of this film. Every performance is unforgettably etched and seems to flow naturally from the background. Ed Harris, Morgan Freeman, Michelle Monaghan, Amy Madigan, and Titus Welliver all deliver extraordinary performances. Amy Ryan delivers an award-worthy performance as a mother who is both repellent and and heartbreakingly pitiable. Casey Affleck follows up his masterful performance in The Assassination of Jesse James ... with another disturbing, but far more understated and complicated performance as the central character. More than any other, his performance draws the viewer into the disquieting moral labyrinth of Gone Baby Gone.
Aside from his work on the screenplay of Good Will Hunting (but definitely not his acting in this film) and his wonderfully self-parodying performance in Shakespeare In Love, I have not been an ardent Ben Affleck fan. With this film, he firmly establishes himself as a talented director. For the first time, I can say that I look forward to the next Ben Affleck film.