Gone Girl (and other movies too)

I realize that it has been five months since I wrote a review about a new movie.  In that "missing time" I have seen four movies in the theater; Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Guardians of the Galaxy, Sin City 2, and Gone Girl.  I took two classes over the summer which might partly explain the decrease in movie watching, but honestly there haven't been many movies that I've wanted to see. 

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes struck me as an extraordinary technical achievement in filmmaking.  The techniques which were used to bring Gollum to life in The Lord of the Rings have been improved significantly.  This movie represents a milestone; human characters and their effect-generated counterparts will become indistinguishable. 

Guardians of the Galaxy fulfilled its promise of being entertaining; which is saying quite a bit these days.  In an environment oversaturated by comic book movies/television shows, this was overall a refreshing deviation from the norm.  Sure it followed well traveled clichés, but the characters and the landscape set it apart.  I will still contend that it would be difficult to make a movie starring a raccoon named Rocket that isn't entertaining.

Sin City 2 followed the amazingly crafted visual experience of Sin City with a blasé, messy, pointless jumble of a movie.  Seriously the only thing this movie does well is reaffirm the notion that sequels are unnecessary.

I went to see Gone Girl last night.  I had seen the poster, but I have avoided any other contact with promotional material.  When David Fincher makes a movie I prefer to see it uncontaminated by spoilers.  Gone Girl will be studied for years to come as an example of mastery in film editing.  Fincher weaves an elaborate mystery, revealing each new piece of information exactly when it best contributes to the overall effect.  The opening dialogue is unsettling, but doesn't quite sink-in until halfway through the film.  Or at least it seems to make sense at the halfway point, when in fact the whole movie is necessary to truly understand.  Rarely have I been so manipulated by storytelling techniques as I was last night, and it wasn't until later that I understood the extent.  As long as you don't realize that you're being manipulated in the moment, it can be a good thing (in filmmaking).  Thanks to Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross' contribution to this film, I also experienced one of the tensest sequences ever filmed.  The sequence I'm referring to was simply a revelation by one of the main characters, but the dialogue, the film editing and the sound design all contributed to enhance the tension.  I feel compelled to include the following statement:  As I said before, this is a David Fincher film, so no matter what qualities I mentioned previously, it's still a Fincher film.

P.S.  I saw the trailer for Clint Eastwood's newest film American Sniper.  I can only assume that Eastwood must have overseen the editing of the trailer, because it is probably the most powerful trailer that I've ever seen.