Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) returns home one afternoon to find
that his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) is missing. A media storm erupts around Nick
and he comes under scrutiny from his wife’s family, his own sister and soon the
entire country as the search for Amy begins. This takes us to the turning point
of David Fincher’s Gone Girl, when
the story becomes split between Nick and the investigation on the one hand and
extracts from his wife’s diary read by Amy herself on the other. A seemingly
run-of-the-mill kidnapping mystery soon becomes an intense scrutiny of the
secrecy within a marriage and the true natures of suspect and culprit.
Rosamund Pike, who I first remember seeing as the
badly-written Bond girl in Die Another
Day has come a long way in the past few years, making a string of
appearances in major blockbusters but never fully realising her full talent.
Fincher has brought out her best performance to date, a noirish femme fatale
combination of dangerous elegance and a piercing icy gaze. The much maligned
but extremely talented Ben Affleck remains inscrutable from the start, his
cold, almost uncaring façade exciting a million different questions and
suspicions within the viewer.
Fincher is always at his best when working in the dark, and
his long-time collaboration with cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth has flourished
into a near-perfect entwinement of narrative and visuals. The shadows pouring
in from windows or shrouding the edges of the frame are pitch black,
inescapable and unsympathetic, whilst the daytime camerawork is draped in a
cool blue-grey palette that is a much needed respite from the gritty, grimy
colours that infect the frame of many contemporary thrillers.
The cool, clean cinematography lends itself well to the
whole feel of the film, where everything is examined coldly and carefully like
a crime scene. Characters and locations are scrutinised implacably by the
camera, whatever their intentions, whether guilty or innocent. As clean-cut as
a forensic report and as intricately constructed as well-planned murder, the
film also dabbles in voyeurism and genuine nastiness. Never mind the characters;
the frame itself is never above suspicion.
Trent Reznor too returns to Fincher’s side to score the film
and provides a grinding, pulsating soundtrack that bubbles slowly beneath the
surface before bursting out in sharp spikes of fury as the twists emerge.
Consider my previous annoyance at Reznor for stealing the 2011 best original
score Oscar out from Hans Zimmer’s nose temporarily revoked. In the case of Gone Girl, the former provides the
musical backdrop to one of the most shocking, coiled-up-in-fear scenes I’ve
seen projected on a cinema screen in too long.
A great deal has already been written concerning the sexual
politics of the film, and it appears that a great deal of that discussion stems
from the source novel and screenplay by Gillian Flynn; in purely filmic terms,
a comparison to Fatal Attraction is
very easily drawn. Without wishing to give too much away, a mystery-thriller
rapidly gives birth to a full-blown ‘battle of the sexes’ drama. Whilst neither
sex emerges above reproach, there were times where I worried that the legendary
outcry from the audience of Fatal
Attraction was more than mere possibility.
Gone Girl ranks
among not only the greatest of Fincher’s work, but the great pieces of
cinematic drama altogether. Coldly calculated, intelligent and at times darkly
humorous, it makes the most of its 150-minute running time to fully unravel and develop interesting characters without ever feeling languorous or dull. One
small piece of advice if you are planning to see it: think twice before taking
a date.
5 stars
