The Eyes Have It

Gone

                Creating a good mystery is a talent. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did it many times and kept the audience guessing until the last few pages when the great detective Sherlock Holmes would wrap it up for the simpletons in a nice little bow. I don’t expect movies to do that to me. I am not easily fooled but sometimes a movie comes around that keeps me guessing. Ghost Rider – Spirit of Vengeance kept me guessing for the wrong reasons. I simply ask that you unravel a story before me. Not an intricate web of deceit that I need to watch 5 times to understand. They were dreaming in Inception, right? I do enjoy those movies too but on a trip to the local multiplex to see a movie, I don’t ask that every movie be the next Inception or Memento or Seven. All I ask is that you treat the story with respect and don’t expect me to believe a 90 pound little person killed a 500 pound guy and then hefted him up the stairs. Unless the name of the movie is MicroSuperman, I'm not buying it.  I have an old saying that applies to this. Don’t jerk me off then say I masturbated. It is a simple if not slightly gross way of saying, don’t tell me to believe something I know is patently false. So when I go to a movie that I want to thrill me with a good mystery, I don’t want to be let off the hook in the first 5 minutes by knowing that Little Mary was murdered by the creepy old man down the road. I want to wonder about him and think maybe he is a little rapey in the eyes but still have doubts until the climax of the movie when it is revealed that her swim coach who didn't look rapey at all killed Little Mary and Mr. Johnson down the block simply missed his own daughter who no longer speaks to him because she descended into a den of drugs after her swim coach showed her the breast stroke (wink wink nudge nudge). The punning has gone too far but the point is, I’m not asking for a lot folks. To quote Nirvana, “Here we are now, entertain us.”

                In Gone, Amanda Seyfried (her of the gigantic eyes) plays Jill Parrish, a woman who was attacked in her home, thrown down a hole in the woods and when she escaped her captor, was told that she had made the whole incident up in some sort of psychotic break. She now spends her days searching the woods around Portland, Oregon looking for the hole and perhaps even the killer. She can't sleep, lives with her alcoholic sister, and works nights at a diner to avoid sleeping during the night.  Then she comes home from work to find her sister missing. Jill is convinced that she was taken by the same man who took her in some attempt to lure Jill back to the hole from which she escaped. The police? Not so much. They think Jill has lost her mind again and when they find out she is carrying a gun, start to chase her. So this leaves Jill with no help and forced to find the killer herself before her sister is killed.  Now you have a mystery/thriller that consistently keeps you guessing. Is Jill crazy? Did her sister go off the wagon and is now sleeping off her alcoholic binge? Why is the detective played by Wes Bentley (the creepy guy who thought a plastic bag was beautiful in American Beauty) so keenly interested in Jill's story? Why is the rest of the police force so bent on believing that she is insane? Indeed, where is Jill’s sister? Did Jill kill her sister? All of these questions can be asked because of the way the story is crafted. There is a definite expiration date on Jill's sister. She will not survive the night if Jill cannot find her. Every near miss with the police or new clue from someone who knows the mysterious "Digger" leads the audience to hope she doesn't get caught.

 I’m a fan of Amanda Seyfried. She emotes well and is the type of actress that grabs the viewer (perhaps with those eyes) and brings you into the movie.  Indeed as we run down the rabbit hole with her, the movie becomes even darker and more nerve racking for the viewer where to urge her to go back and call the police.  Her desperation and belief that the killer has her sister pulls you back and forth convincing you that she is both insane and telling the truth. The evidence that she follows leads to many unsavory characters and unsettling moments where you await the killer to emerge behind her and grab her as she moves through his lair.  This suspense is all a credit to Seyfried who keeps Jill from being too insane but right on the line of rational to slightly nutty. Her supporting cast (Bentley, Sebastian Stan, the creepy Joel David Moore and Dexter's Jennifer Carpenter) help pull you back and forth between her  insanity or back towards the land of the relatively sane. In my last review, Nicholas Cage leapt right off the rope to insane in his role as Ghost Rider when more restraint would have been more compelling. Seyfried fights the inclination to play it completely insane and grounds Jill, playing her as a woman who was wronged both by the killer and the police.   

This film is far more of a Little Red Riding Hood tale than the actual Red Riding Hood that Amanda Seyfried made last year. I thought I had this movie figured out at numerous times but was wrong most of the time.  I know that half of you will claim that you weren’t surprised by the ending at all. I hate people like this. You claim that the most intricate of mysteries didn’t have you fooled as though to admit you were engaged in a movie makes you look stupid. I was convinced I knew who the killer was. I knew it in my bones and I was wrong. This movie may not be the next Silence of the Lambs or a Sherlock Holmes masterpiece but it is a compelling story. I rooted for Jill and hoped she would find her answers, if not to save her sister to save her own sanity. The dark brooding city of Portland offers a character in and of itself and the woods seem scary by their vastness. The movie is not perfect. There are flaws in general with the story but I found myself not caring about them and just accepting the flaws and moving on with Jill. When you allow that a movie is not perfect, you allow the movie to engage you. Give up you preconceptions and hopes for a perfect thriller and accept that Gone is simply a good story. It has flaws, as does any story but the flaws don’t take away your enjoyment of the movie, you do that to yourself.

Mr. Unhappy sez: This movie is probably “Gone” already from the multiplexes but I would definitely recommend it for a cold dark night when you want to snuggle with your wife…or girlfriend…or both. Of course, the last option means you soon may be “Gone” yourself.