Shock and Awe

Rating: 10/10 (25 January 2015)

How on earth is this film attracting so much criticism?! This is one of the best films of 2014 and people are labelling it "utter tripe", "an enormous heap of illogic and nonsense", "wish I had missed it". Are these people serious? Can we no longer appreciate - or even identify - a great film?!
Gone Girl is a peerless plot-driven story about a wife who goes missing. Seems pretty ordinary, right? Well it's not. And it doesn't take very long at all for any sane viewer to recognise this.
You start watching and - as you do with any mystery - you start collecting the clues and piecing together an explanation for the events which have taken place. But no sooner than you have formed the perfect explanation in your mind is it immediately swept away in the most overwhelming twist of the year.
And it only gets better from there.
Gone Girl is a roller-coaster; only you're riding it in the dark. You don't know where the next turn is, you can't see where you're headed, and you have no idea how many more ups and downs you're going to experience before it's all over.
It's a film that keeps you guessing and just as you're beginning to (once again) think you've got it all figured out, the game changes and it's all up in the air once more.
The diary-exposition format is also very clever and was executed perfectly. Many films fall victim to losing the viewer when jumping back and forth between past and present, yet Gone Girl - you guessed it - does it just right.
This film ranks high in the mystery/thriller genre. It is just as compelling and perplexing as Shutter Island - if not then moreso.
And let's not forget: the acting. Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike do a phenomenal job in their roles as husband and wife. Not a line feels out of place and both seem as though they were born to play Nick and Amy Dunne. By the end of the film I felt so immersed in their story that I found it hard to believe it was just a film.
All in all, I for one am thoroughly pleased with Gone Girl. I knew from watching the trailer it would be something I would like, I just never imagined it could thrill me this much.
A very underrated and overwhelming story that should be enjoyed by all.