Well done and all that but highly unsatisfying

Rating: 7/10 (23 February 2015)

This movie was very well done in terms of acting by all parties concerned, and the story was very creative - it was a "non-Hollywoodish" film in that the characters are not likable, and SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER - it doesn't resolve in a way that you can say "justice is served" so it is the antithesis of a Hollywood movie (or TV show). I kept making a mental comparison to Criminal Minds in which you can count on easy resolutions, a clear path from A to Z (or A to B more likely), and the bad guys getting caught. That type of crime story may be fun to fill 42 minutes with, but one can easily recognize how empty it is.
But in Gone Girl, the opposite was true; it was complicated, it was hard to figure out what would happen next, it was full of surprises, the acting was not one-dimensional, and to many people's annoyance (including mine), justice was not only served; in fact, injustice was "heartily rewarded." My husband and I talked a lot about the movie afterward trying to pinpoint why we both disliked it. The main thing, I think, was that after investing 2 and a half hours we both went away with a "sour taste." That is largely because of the ending - SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER - which not only didn't resolve, which I can appreciate, but which did not make sense in the larger context of the film. Long story short (SPOILER) when Affleck's character decided to live with his returned wife after she had shown herself to be a dangerous psychopath who had, earlier, specifically tried to destroy his life, I could not understand why he decided to make a go of it anyway. He hadn't shown himself to be madly in love with her, so that didn't seem to be a motive; and the threat she hurled (he'd be publicly reviled if he left her) was much lesser of a threat than being around a creator of diabolical plots who he knew had destroyed several others and tried to destroy him as well. Having that having over one's head would seem intolerable.
So, I simply could not understand how that fit and it was a disappointment after enduring so much time spent wondering how things would go for these generally unlikable individuals caught up in an admittedly intriguing story.
I give the film a lot of credit for the creativity of the writers and acting skill of the participants, but in the end had to admit it was a largely unenjoyable experience.