Gone Baby Gone

Directed by Ben Affleck
Written by Ben Affleck and Aaron Stockard, based on the novel by Dennis Lehane
Starring Casey Affleck, Michelle Monaghan, Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris, John Ashton, Amy Ryan

Actor Ben Affleck makes an impressive directorial debut in the engrossing dramatic thriller Gone Baby Gone. Though shot in a simple, no-frills style, the film layers on moral complexity until the protagonist is forced to make an agonizing decision that could affect a life forever and has to live with the nagging uncertainty that his choice was wrong.

Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Gennaro (Michello Monaghan), partners in a private investigation business and also lovers, are asked to help the Boston police in searching for a missing four year old girl by the kid's aunt Bea McCready (Amy Madigan). The little girl's mother Helene McCready (Amy Ryan) is the starting point in Kenzie and Gennaro's investigation, and is revealed to be far different than the press' portrait of her as a saintly grieving mother. Young and somewhat naive, Kenzie connects with some of the people he knows from growing up on the streets of Boston, and quickly finds that Helene's drug and alcohol abuse may be key factors in the disappearance.

Captain Jack Doyle (Morgan Freeman) leads the special police unit that handles kidnappings, Doyle himself the victim of the kidnapping of his child that went fatally wrong. Doyle orders his two lead investigating officers, Bressant (Ed Harris) and Poole (John Ashton) to cooperate with Kenzie and Gennaro, the two PIs quickly proving able to make connections on the street that are closed to the cops.

But everything is not as it seems. Gone Baby Gone winds its serpentine way through a complex story that finds that the moral certainties we hold are shot through with so many veins of grey that making the right choice is not only near impossible, it is almost undesirable. The story argues that even righteous, just choices are usually made for the wrong reasons. In such a moral minefield, Kenzie can only hope to survive, and he is ultimately helpless in the soul-eroding tides that buffet him.

Director Affleck and photographer John Toll (who also lensed Terrence Malick's phenomenal The Thin Red Line) capture the streets and the people of Boston with convincing, personal immediacy. A sequence involving a raid on a dingy house, which turns into a nightmarish headlong flight and a confrontation with pure human evil, is particularly nail-biting, accomplished with a lean and spare shooting and editing style. On the strength of this film, Ben Affleck has a successful career as a director ahead of him.

The dialogue crackles, and it is delivered by a superb cast, with Ed Harris in particular at the top of his game. Casey Affleck shines as the main protagonist, projecting a core naivete that is dragged through the ringer as he is forced to confront some agonizing choices. Harris and Affleck share a scene that sparks with vitality and drama -- and it is all acting and dialogue. It all leads up inevitably to a final agonizing choice, and a final shot that is searingly effective in its simple ability to provoke discussion over the viability of that choice.

Gone Baby Gone is a smart, involving slice of neo-noir.