Serviceable & watchable, but definitely not Top 250 material....

Rating: 5/10 (3 January 2016)

Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) returns home to find that his wife Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike) has gone missing. Due to the circumstances surrounding Amy's disappearance and due to the media circus that her disappearance has created - there are other factors that influence both the police, the public and the media into believing that Amy isn't missing at all and that Nick may have something to do with his wife's disappearance. But what has actually happened to Amy?
At nearly 2 and a half hours in length one worry I had with Gone Girl is that I might have found parts of the film a little bit boring. Thankfully, pacing is one of the things that is actually good about Gone Girl - perhaps this is because Gillian Flynn penned the screenplay which she adapted from her own book. The lead up to Amy's disappearance is also relatively satisfactory - character development for Nick and Amy was solid and Flynn did enough here to get me involved with both the characters and the story.
Gone Girl has a seedy murky atmosphere to it which actually complements the material really well. David Fincher is once again more than competent in his directorial duties. The performances from the cast are all reasonably good - I've never been a big fan of Affleck as an actor (I've personally always felt that he's better as a Director), but he's actually reasonably good here. Rosamund Pike is a great actress and doesn't disappoint here (even though she's portraying a troubled and rather complex character). Neil Patrick Harris is wasted in a small role where he's only really used as a plot device.
The first half of the film is where the picture is at its strongest and I have to admit that it did hold my interest. It did seem to present itself as a bit of a heavy-handed morality play at times, but at least it had something to say. Sadly the second half is much weaker and is filled with plot turns that are either predictable or downright bizarre. Suspension of disbelief is also going to be a big influence on how much you'll enjoy this picture - it features a missing woman that no-one seems to be looking for and that no-one seems to recognise - despite the fact that her face is plastered all over the news more or less continuously.
Gone Girl is by no means a bad film and is perfectly watchable, but I'm surprised that a film that's mostly predictable, at times lacks logic, and at times requires possibly too much suspension of belief is proudly sitting comfortably within IMDb Top 250 list. It's actually its rather flattering status that annoys me more than anything else.