Gone Baby Gone

"I will hate you for doing this, and I don't want to."

There have been a lot of solid movies set in Boston in recent years, but Gone Baby Gone tops even The Departed and Mystic River, as good as they both were. What starts off as a story about a missing child evolves into one of the most thought provoking and genuinely compelling movies that I've seen.

Ben Affleck has real talent as a director, and did an excellent job of maintaining the authenticity of both the story of the Dennis Lehane novel and the neighborhood that it's set in. Casey Affleck, Michelle Monaghan, Ed Harris, Morgan Freeman, and Amy Ryan were all perfectly cast, and give stellar performances.

Gone Baby Gone is just one of those movies that it's hard to find a flaw with. It's expertly made, sticks with you, and doesn't offer any easy answers. Highly recommended.

I would consider myself to be a movie buff and I live and grew up in Massachusetts. I must tell you that Ben Affleck has done an outstanding job in his directorial debut. In casting his brother Casey you may think that it's just nepotism or giving his brother a break. No. He is the absolute perfect person to play this role. Because they know the area they have made one of the most authentic movies I've ever seen. And it's not just some Boston movie either. I heard a woman as I was leaving saying it's just like The Departed. No it's not, it's much better and the fact is, I loved The Departed. But that was flashier. As great as it was you could tell people were acting. Not here. They seemed exactly like the degenerates and handful of decent folk I see every day of my life. The woman who plays the girl's mother, I don't know who see is, but I've met her about 1000 times.

As far as the story goes I'd never spoil it for you but it's complex, not confusing. There is a lot going on and it's so real. I don't know what's happened in this area but people have become so lousy. So lousy that if you're a good person you just don't know what can be done anymore. There seems to be no answer sometimes and this film is set in that world. If you have the brains and heart to try you don't even know what will come of it.

Who should see this? Intelligent people. People who want to come out of a movie thinking about what they just saw. People who want to see an incredibly well made film. And anyone who ever liked Ben Affleck even for half a second. He should be very proud of this movie. As far as content there are loads of curse words, some drug use, but no nudity that I can remember, and there is some gun violence, but nothing too bad. Put it high on your movie going list.

When I went into the theater to see Gone Baby Gone, Casey Affleck was not what I pictured when I read Dennis Lehane's Patrick Kenzie novels. But he won me over and will now forever be Kenzie as far as I'm concerned.

Gone Baby Gone is a tough and gritty movie about a child abduction and the lives it destroys. You can see the end coming a little too early in the movie, but it's still fascinating watching Kenzie slog through a lot of awful stuff before you get there. Ben Affleck has proved that he can direct a movie with the best of them. There was nothing slack or boring for the entire running time, and the ending will give you something to argue about over dinner after watching the movie.

The best detective movie I've seen in a while.

Every once in a while, amid the dross that reviewers have to sit through, comes a movie that hits like a sucker punch to the gut and haunts you long after you've left the theater. Such is the case with Gone Baby Gone.

Based on the book by Dennis Lehane (Mystic River), Gone Baby Gone marks the directorial debut of Ben Affleck, who also penned the screenplay in tandem with Aaron Stockard, and easily puts him at the front of the line for Oscar contention.

Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan star as a pair of private investigators based in the rough working class Dorchester district of Boston. The two are hired by the family of a missing four-year-old girl to assist the police investigation because of their street connections and ability to get people to talk who otherwise would never open up to a cop. As they navigate through the neighborhood's seamy underbelly of pimps, drug dealers and crack whores they uncover an ever-expanding mystery that takes on the added dimension of provoking the question of just what is right and what is wrong, firmly pitting both story and viewer in a struggle between situational ethics and moral absolutes.

Morgan Freeman and Ed Harris round out an impressive cast, but it's the younger Affleck who takes this movie on his back and runs with it, easily surpassing his director brother in terms of acting breadth and range. This is no slight to Ben, however. It's been a long time since I was this impressed with a directorial debut, and even longer since I was given cause to reflect upon the values that we hold dear as individuals and a society, and the moral foundations upon which they are based. Gone Baby Gone manages both, and wraps it up in a hard-hitting detective story that serves as much to satisfy the baser urges of bar fights and gun play, as it does tackling bigger issues.

It's also one of those rare movies in which it can easily be said that the less you know about the story going in, the richer the experience. There's no clear twist ending to give away, but rather a layered story that unfolds like a Russian stacking doll with a moral dilemma at its core.

One thing I do feel comfortable revealing, however, is that this movie comes about as close as any can to being a bonafide lock come Academy Award time. Congrats Ben, you may well have redeemed yourself from your J-Lo/Gigli reputation at last.

Ben Affleck's impressive directorial debut features some remarkably naturalistic performances, a genuine sense of locale, and an atmosphere of despair and hopelessness that becomes a major antagonist. An honestly downbeat film, it portrays a mode of existence where nothing is black or white, and it is that gray area that the film explores so effectively even if I find the story from Dennis Leheane's novel to be a bit far-fetched and convoluted. More than The Departed, Mystic River, and Peter Yates' The Friends of Eddie Coyle, Gone, Baby, Gone understands the inter-relationship among cops, criminals, and a neighborhood as they search for a missing child. Though the boyish Casey Affleck is arguably miscast as Patrick, a character who was more mature in the novel, his performance cannot be faulted and by the end he has won us over. The last scene is particularly resonant. Though well-known actors such as Ed Harris and Morgan Freeman are expectedly good, it is the performances of an unknown supporting cast that gives the film a disturbing authenticity. And Amy Ryan as the child's mother gives a trenchant performance. Director Affleck maintains an admirable tone of objectivity and compassion throughout, and he has made a film that is worthy of your time. Go!Baby!Go!