Too Many Loose Ends

Rating: 4/10 (15 November 2014)

I have not read the book so I cannot compare this movie with the book. But judging from the fact that Gillian Flynn has also written the screenplay of the movie I trust that the movie has done justice to the book. Which might not be a very good thing to say about the book because I wasn't very impressed with the movie.
Please don't get me wrong, I like David Fincher's works. He picks up off-the-line subjects and execute them very well. Sometimes he also leaves loose ends. Loose ends are not bad because sometimes they get the audience to think more than what the movie is trying to convey. Unfortunately, this movie has too many loose ends and turns. The movie starts as a psychological thriller then turns into a treasure hunt with well-planted clues which are easily understandable; then into a war between a smart psychopath wife and a clueless husband. In the end, the movie turns into a common hate story of a husband and a wife.
What surprises me in the movie is that the wife is a smart psychopath, the philandering husband also gets there gradually, being smart. But the general public, media and FBI are just dumb. How is it that FBI is not able to understand that a man gets enough time to go to his father's house to burn the diary but does not have enough time to burn it completely and still leave pages which can get him caught? How it is that FBI cannot find the missing wife? Now I am not a detective but I do know the general modus operandi of any detective agency - keep a tab on the previous acquaintances of a missing girl. Might not be a bad idea to pay a visit to one of her ex-boyfriends and Viola, there she is, living a good life. Found and case closed. More surprisingly, when the missing wife has decided to come back nobody even wants to re-look at the clues that she had planted against her husband. After all, everyone had started to doubt him. The list does not finish here. How come the camera at Desi's house can only catch her alone, evidently tortured. But there is no video of Desi actually torturing her. But no one wants to ask these questions to the wife. Only a few questions and FBI just lets her go. How come doctors forgot to check her so called bruises which she was supposed to have when her husband was supposedly dragging her?
So there are too many loose ends. Is it that the makers of the movie think that the general public both within the movie and out of the movie is so dumb? Within the movie, the general public thinks of the husband as bad guy when the wife is missing. But when she is found nobody is questioning her motives and now the poor-dead-ex-boyfriend is a bad guy.
On top that, there is a supposedly smart lawyer (Tyler Perry) who is of no help to the husband besides making few funny comments.
On the good side, Ben Affleck and Carrie Coon still managed to be convincing. Rosamund Pike is Okay. But that's the only good part I could see.
All in all, I am a little disappointed with David Fincher. Se7en, Fight Club and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button were really good movies and had given its audiences lot to think about. Unfortunately, this movie does not do that besides giving message that every man is a sex maniac and women are psychos. What surprises me the most, the book and the movie are getting good ratings.
These are only my opinions but if you still want to watch it please go ahead. After all it is your money. It does have few funny moments.