Gritty policier about the limits of policing

Rating: 7/10 (10 November 2007)

The movies Gone Baby Gone and Mystic River are both adaptations of books by the same author. Gone Baby Gone was the author's earlier work, and it explores much of the same territory as the later book. Interestingly, the movie versions have a parallel workmanship. Gone Baby Gone was directed by a first-timer (Ben Affleck), with a young actor as the lead, while Mystic River was directed by a very experienced director (Clint Eastwood), with a mature actor in its lead role. One would expect that comparing the two movies would be like comparing a soup to a stew: The stew should be richer, with more texture, flavor, and subtlety.
It's a surprise, then, that I liked Gone Baby Gone nearly as much Mystic River. The reason is that these movies are not really about their police investigation plots. They are about the choices people make when faced with the limits of police in providing justice. With the older characters in Mystic Rivers, one understands that they are at a time in their lives when they're acting largely on personal ethical codes that have been in place for decades. In Gone Baby Gone, one has the treat of seeing a young person thrust into situations that force him to make the decisions that will crystallize his ethical codes for decades to come, as well as the choices of older people fed up with the limits of the police.
The vehicle for illustrating the choice of a young man is Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck), a young private investigator, aided by his girlfriend, Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan). Kenzie plies his trade in Boston's tough, working-class, Dorchester neighborhood. Based on his contacts in the neighborhood, Kenzie provides detectives with the first valuable leads in the case. This leads to the detectives confronting the girl's mother, Helene (Amy Ryan). Helene turns out to have been snorting coke for two hours when she first claimed to have left her daughter alone for just a few minutes. This is where the first of Casey's qualms starts. Helene is not only a coke addict, but predictably, a selfish, immature, and irresponsible woman, thoroughly unfit for motherhood. As the detectives grill Helene, Kenzie's face shows his struggle: If he finds the daughter, should he bring her back to her mother? If he shouldn't, should he lie to the mother about this in the meantime to keep her cooperation? This is just the first of many choices that Kenzie has to make as he follows the case down some very dark and dangerous paths. What's pleased me is that throughout the movie, Kenzie acted exactly as you'd expect an ethical, grounded, but *young* person to act when trying to do the right thing in morally murky situations. There were no heroics that were out of character, none of the deliberations a more experienced and jaded PI would have gone through, and even his questionable actions stem from a desire for a just outcome. The irony is that his investigation keeps getting covertly blocked by more experienced adults also trying to do what's right, but from a more world-weary perspective.
There are some very good performances in this film. Affleck, in only his second major film, turns in solid work as Kenzie. He's believably street-wise, tenacious, stoic, and decent. Ed Harris, as Det. Remy Broussant, is the center of gravity in almost every scene he's in  without chewing up the scenery. But the real surprise is Amy Ryan as Helene. It's tough to play someone as unsympathetic as Helene and still make her believable, and she hits every note perfectly. There were times when I even found myself rooting for her to redeem herself, only to be disappointed when she failed.
There are some problems with the film, as you'd expect with a first-time director. The character of Angie is given too little to do, which is a shame, since Monaghan's performance hinted that she's just as capable an actress as Affleck is an actor. There are a few sequences that needed to be trimmed or cut. In addition, the episodic structure of the film is jerky, looking like it was going to end several times during the film, rather than going smoothly to the next segment. The Dorchester accents get very thick, making a fair amount of the dialog impossible to understand in detail. Morgan Freeman, reliable when playing a straight-arrow character, is unconvincing as someone dealing in shades of gray. But the worst blunder is the speeches passed off as dialog, especially the ones in the movie's climactic scene. They are completely out of character for the people in the scene, and they could have been made into crisp dialog fairly easily, if the director had wanted.
Overall, however, the film's strengths far outweigh its flaws. I look forward to seeing more from both Afflecks in the future.