Nick and Amy Dunne (played by Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike, respectively) met in New York City at a time when things were going well for both of them. He, a good-looking "everyman" type from Missouri, was a writer for a men's magazine. She, a beautiful heiress and the inspiration for a series of children's books called Amazing Amy, wrote quizzes for women's magazines. As is common early in relationships, they both tried hard and perhaps put on a bit of a show to get and keep the other person. He perhaps tried to seem smarter and more cultured than he was. She eventually readily admits that she played the part of the "cool girl," the girl who eats pizza and drinks beer without ever gaining a pound, who watches sports and doesn't care if he blows her off to hang out with the guys once in awhile.
Of course, they couldn't keep up the act forever, and once things got rough, the cracks in their relationship started to show. The recession led both of them to lose their jobs and her parents, the authors of Amazing Amy, to have to dip into her trust fund. His mom got sick, and they moved to Missouri, where she used the rest of her savings to help him open a bar with his sister. She resented the move. He resented the fact that he was beholden to her financially and that she was so unhappy in his hometown. Their relationship dynamic changed; in New York, people respected her Harvard degree and thought it was cool that she was the inspiration for Amazing Amy. In Missouri, people thought she was uppity and gravitated toward Nick, who they knew and loved. He began having an affair with a much-younger woman.
All of this is revealed in the first third of the movie, which begins on the morning of Amy's disappearance. The film alternates between the present, in which Amy's disappearance causes a media circus, Nick maybe doesn't seem quite upset enough that she's gone, and people begin to suspect him of murder, and the past, which is told to us through Amy's diary entries. In the second third, we learn what has really happened to Amy, and things get twisty. In the last third, a carefully laid-out plan goes awry, and things get off-the-rails insane. This is not to say that things get unbelievable. It is to say that it becomes very difficult to predict where things might go.
I'm glad that I read the book before seeing the movie, not because the movie was hard to follow or left out anything that I considered crucial, but because reading the book, I had a very emotional reaction. Watching the movie knowing what was coming, I was able to get past that and appreciate the story, which is really very clever. I felt almost betrayed while reading the book. You learn in the second third that one of the narrators is unreliable, and I felt cheated by that; it wasn't fair, I thought, to lead the reader down one path only to pull the rug out from under them and say, "oh, ha ha; you're dealing with an entirely different kind of character than you were led to believe you were." The thing is, though, while it might not be "fair," it's not just a thing that happens in fictional stories. It happens in relationships, which is perhaps the thesis of the story: after you get to know someone and they've dropped whatever façade they had to put on in order to win you, after things happen that make it impossible for you to pretend that they are the person you hoped they were and wanted them to be, and after you have been through things together that cause the dynamics of the relationship to change, you are sometimes left with a very different person than you thought you started with. At this point, you either learn to love the other person as they are, or you act out, or you break up. Sometimes, the two of you have different ideas about what should happen at this point, and things get worse before they either get better or don't. The second act of Gone Girl is the author dropping the façade and letting you see things how they really are, and once you can get past your emotional reaction to how you feel about having that "done to you," you can appreciate how brilliant it is.
I was able to enjoy watching the movie more than I enjoyed reading the book not only because I had the initial emotional reaction at the author's "betrayal" out of the way, but because the performances are completely amazing. I've really turned a corner on Ben Affleck in the past five years. I used to dislike him for a number of reasons, but he is absolutely perfect in this role, and-- I'm going to make a bold statement here-- I would not be at all upset if he won an Oscar for this. Yes. I just said that. This is a character who has to come across as charming and handsome, but who you also have to believe is definitely an adulterer, possibly abusive, and possibly a murderer. I can't think of anyone better for this role than Ben Affleck. As Amy, Rosamund Pike has to come across as extremely multi-faceted, as well, and she's also great. I know that Reese Witherspoon produced this movie and at one point wanted to star in it; Reese Witherspoon is my favorite, and I think she could have been good in this role, but I think it makes more sense for Amy to be played by a less well-known actor. With Nick, you need someone who is instantly likeable who you could believe might be capable of sinister things in spite of the fact that you like him; having a well-known actor in that role speeds that process along. With Amy, not having a preconceived persona to place on the character works much better: she could be anything or anyone, and she needs to be. There are some supporting actors in the cast, too, and they're all well-cast, but when it comes down to it, this is the Nick and Amy show, and Affleck and Pike both knock it out of the park.
The ending is controversial. It's the same in both the book and movie. The odd thing is, while it made me want to throw the book across the room, and while I heard some people in the theater (including some of the people I was with) say they hated it, I really thought it worked in the film. (For that matter, I think I would like it in the book upon rereading.) Is it bleak? Yes. Is it the only outcome that could have befallen these two characters? No, but it works, it's believable, and it's kind of wickedly awesome in it's way. I can see how other endings might have been more satisfying, but I found this ending unsettling in a realistic way.
I really liked the film. I'd strongly recommend.
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