'Gone Girl' works as a intriguing mystery with outstanding performances from Affleck and Pike

Rating: 10/10 (21 June 2015)

"You two are the most f*cked up people I've ever met and I deal with f*cked up people for a living."
While shopping with my mother at Walmart, I decided I wanted to get a few books. So, I looked through the books, and I found the one book that interested me: Gone Girl. So, I got the book and began reading it over a week during school and outside of school. I was enthralled, because it was a mystery story that I never expected. So, shortly after I finished the book, I watched the film. I watched it late at night, and didn't really pay attention to half of it. I recently decided to rewatch it since it was on HBO, and I'm now ready to do a full review of the film. So, let's dive into the mystery everybody was enthralled by.
Gone Girl follows a man who comes home to a crime scene and gets involved headfirst in a investigation involving the disappearance of his wife, and his life soon turns into a roller-coaster ride from hell.
It's kind of hard to talk about this film without spoiling it, because it's such an intense and complicated film, that if you really want to do it justice, you need to talk about the film intensely. I'll try my best.
One of the best things about the film is definitely the acting. Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike really carry this movie straight through to the end, and give very realistic performances that do help ground this crazy ass film in reality. I'm very much shocked that Rosamund Pike was robbed of the Oscar, because she truly deserved it, for reasons I won't spoil. Tyler Perry was a riot as Tanner Bolt, the lawyer who reluctantly agrees to represent Affleck's character. He was serious in some scenes, and in others, delivered some of the best lines in the film. Carrie Coon did a good job as Go, Nick Dunne (Affleck)'s twin sister, and she truly portrayed the sister stuck in the middle of this strange case. The only cast member I was unsure about, and still am, is Neil Patrick Harris. It was weird to me that such an openly gay person was portraying a straight man. I mean, no offense to him being gay, I am myself, but it just seemed rather odd and took me out of the movie a bit. Aside from that, his performance was okay.
The music by Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor is amazing. I listened to it on it's own and it still held up just as well. My favorite track from the OST is probably Empty Places, and it's reprise, because it just conveys the feelings Nick is feeling during the film. The cinematography in this film... just damn. The scenes all look really cold and empty, which is, I suppose, what you're supposed to feel in a film like this, and it works so well against the dark story unfolding before our eyes.
The screenplay, written by Gillian Flynn, who also wrote the novel, is basically the same as the novel, however the ending has been changed a bit. It's not a bad change or anything, in fact, on the first watch-through, I hadn't really noticed the ending had been tampered with. It still works just as well as it did in the novel though. The film editing is great too. The timestamps, like what they did in the novel, work very well on film, and I'm glad. That was one of the things that I was wondering how they would do it, going in.
My problem with the film stems from the third act. The third act is a bit over-the-top and a bit too unbelievable at times. It's still a fantastic finale, and I do really enjoy it, it's just that I could feel a bit of a step down when we reached the ending. Also, and this is kind of a spoiler, so I'll put a spoiler tag on this. When Amy does her monologue and talks about the cool girl, in the novel, we've seen her be a 'cool girl,' but in the film, that is barely shown and doesn't really help sell the image that Amy is trying to put on us.
Overall, however, Gone Girl is an achievement in filmmaking. The acting, cinematography, music, editing, and screenplay are all on point. While the third act does delve into the insane, Amy's 'cool girl' thing isn't explained as well, and Neil Patrick Harris was miscast (in my opinion), the film still holds up remarkably well and is a intriguing thriller that is a great addition to David Fincher's line of works.
9/10 | Grade: A-