A Half Decent Cast Offer Bad Performances In An Awful Movie

Rating: 2/10 (20 August 2018)

The cast of "Gone Girl" is half decent. The leads are relatively big names - Ben Affleck as Nick and Rosamund Pike as Amy (not the biggest, but certainly known.) The supporting cast wouldn't cause me to swoon, but they're decent enough (people like Tyler Perry, Kim Dickens and Neil Patrick Harris are in this.) But regardless of the so-called "critical consensus" (which seems to be very positive) you don't have to get very far into this to discover that you have a half decent cast in what's at best a third-rate movie.
I thought the performances by and large (from everyone) were awful. It's as if this half decent cast realized from the start that they were starring in one dog of a movie. The story had some potential. As it starts Amy and Nick are a seemingly happy young couple on top of the world, with money and in love. But things don't work out well for them, they lose their jobs and they have to move from New York City to Missouri to care for Nick's elderly parents and everything about their life unravels. Ultimately - and here's where the whole thing (which wasn't that good to start) falls apart - Amy fakes her own death, and manages to frame Nick for her murder. Nick isn't a good guy - in fact there's not a single character in this movie who's really likeable or sympathetic, except possibly Det. Boney (Dickens) - and once his wife is "killed" he becomes the immediate prime suspect (more by the tabloid media than by Boney, who's never entirely convinced about what's happening.) He gets portrayed as a sociopath, but it's really Amy who's the crazy sociopath. The first hour or so of the movie deals with Nick being hounded by the police and media. Then comes the twist - Amy is alive and hiding out, and we get flashbacks now to see how she set the whole thing up. Then another plot twist as Amy's hiding out crashes and burns; then another plot twist with the ex-boyfriend she seeks refuge from; then another plot twist as she returns home. It's not interesting - it's more mind-numbing. It goes on way, way, way too long. Once you get to the third or fourth plot twist you're wondering "good God - how long can this go on?" And it goes on far too long. Actually once we're into the story that follows the last plot twist I actually found myself chuckling at times (especially at discovering that the police and hospital have sent Amy back home after she resurfaces, still covered in blood - they could't clean her up?) I wasn't chuckling because it was funny - but because it was just so bad. To me, it seems as if to really like this movie you have to be one of those pathetic "professional victim" men, who think women and the world are all out to get them. This will certainly feed their paranoia. (2/10)