Gone Girl

This weekend, I went to see one of the most anticipated movies in a long, long time: Gone Girl.

I'm going to cut straight to the chase. This movie was great, and you should go see it. It's that good.

The quick spoiler-less summary is that beautiful, blonde Amy goes missing. It seems very much like her husband, Nick, did it. That's just about everything you need to know.

I liked the book, written by Gillian Flynn, and she also wrote the screenplay. It's clear that the same author did both because it seems like the writer knew this story better than anyone. She's a good writer and you can see that at every step of the film. It's smart, and has an attention to detail that again (without being spoiler-y) adds up perfectly to the ending.

Speaking of the book, don't be worried that you won't get anything out of this movie. It doesn't follow the book precisely, but it still gives you that same emotional rollercoaster. Different, but not in a ruinous way. When I was reading the novel, I thought that there were certain things that wouldn't translate well into film, and they worked around all of that.

To be honest, I could take or leave Ben Affleck in this movie. He wasn't spectacular. He did his job, but I never thought it was great. He's not memorable.

Rosamund Pike (Amy, the girl who is gone), however. Yikes. She was on fire. She's been on the back burner for so long. She was in one of those Simon Pegg movies as the love interest, and in Pride and Prejudice as not Keira Knightley, and was a Bond girl one time. Always just in the fringe, never your main focus. Well dang. She is so finessed and perfect in her role as Amy that even the less-believable parts of the story are immediately sold to you. She makes this film. If anything comes from this movie, I hope it's her launch from the side-kick to the leading lady.

Tyler Perry is also in this as the comic relief. You don't realize you want him there until you think about how dark everything is without him. Another great performance.

I can't say enough about this movie. It's getting almost universal critical acclaim. The one caveat is that it is an R-rated film, and I assure that it lives up to that rating. If you're squeamish, hate the swearing, and don't want to see anyone's naughty bits, I would skip it. Otherwise, buckle in for a great time.