Article by Olivia Simonson. Photo by Olivia Simonson.
Review Contains Spoilers.
Over the past few weeks, Professor Johansson and his fiction class have gathered to view different movies and discuss some key points afterward. I had the honor of attending their viewing of the 2014 film Gone Girl, a movie starring Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike as a married couple whose relationship is falling apart. The psychological aspect of this movie keeps audiences engaged while forcing them to ask one crucial question throughout – who is right?
Even a day later, I am still processing so much of this movie. While aspects like sound and lighting play a role in the tone of the film, the main reason why people keep coming back to this movie is the characters.
Nick Dunne, played by Affleck, wakes up the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary like normal. As the day progresses, he gets a harmless phone call from his neighbor, and he returns home to “fix” the problem. As he enters the house, he finds his wife gone and the living room a mess.
Amy Dunne, played by Pike, is perceived to be missing and possibly dead, and it is up to Nick and the detectives to find her. At first, everything seems to point to a kidnapping, but as more character flaws come to light, the story seems to change.
Nick Dunne, for the first part of the movie, is portrayed to be a horrible husband. He doesn’t remember much about his wife’s life outside their home, he doesn’t have any suspects on who might have taken her, and it is revealed that Nick was having an affair with one of his students and Amy didn’t know. Amy also kept a diary, and the film uses the diary to show Amy’s perspective while she is missing. According to the diary, Nick abused her, secretly hating her and wishing she were gone, and Amy eventually comes to fear that he may kill her.
All of these aspects are designed to make people hate Nick Dunne, but then the script flips, showing us that Amy was not kidnapped – she left. She left a crime scene that she knew Nick would take the fall for, making sure that he knew that she was aware of the affair. She then flees town, hanging low until the time is right to kill herself, making sure her body can be found and pinned back on Nick as the murderer. This leaves audiences wondering if Nick, even with his infidelity, deserves to be tried for murder, found guilty, and die, as Missouri does have the death penalty.
While we start to see the “real” Amy, it is revealed that the diary is a lie, making us question if Nick is truly an awful person. Amy is seen to manipulate men on multiple occasions to get what she wants, with one scene going as far as to have Amy fake sexual assault to punish a former boyfriend. We see some psychopathic tendencies as she manipulates another ex-boyfriend into hiding her, claiming that Nick is the one who is after her and trying to kill her.
The third act provides another twist and leaves audiences once again reeling over who is right. I will not go into much detail in case you still have not seen the movie, but it portrays how much Amy and Nick deserve each other, and how the rest of their lives are going to look.
While the characters are the main draw for audiences, the writing for this should not be ignored. It is written to have multiple unreliable narrators, leaving us to figure out in the end what was truth and what was a lie. The way this script captures a psychopath’s behavior is truly awe-inspiring. While it was Rosamund’s acting that made it believable, the written scenes leave audiences in shock and disgust, which speaks volumes about how good the writing really is.
I do not believe that I can truly do this movie justice in writing, as there is so much about these characters and the screenplay to unpack. With its dark themes and messages, this movie deserves a rewatch to fully understand everything that is going on, and I highly recommend that those who have only seen it once (myself included) go back in and take a second look, forcing themselves to ask the question – are they all wrong?
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