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I went to see Gone Girl this weekend, spurred by reports from several Lovefraud readers that the film reminded them of the psychopaths in their lives.
In my opinion, the story was a realistic portrayal of psychopathic behavior until it descended into psychopathic cliché.
Here’s the official synopsis on GoneGirlMovie.com:
GONE GIRL — directed by David Fincher and based upon the global bestseller by Gillian Flynn — unearths the secrets at the heart of a modern marriage. On the occasion of his fifth wedding anniversary, Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) reports that his beautiful wife, Amy (Rosamund Pike), has gone missing. Under pressure from the police and a growing media frenzy, Nick’s portrait of a blissful union begins to crumble. Soon his lies, deceits and strange behavior have everyone asking the same dark question: Did Nick Dunne kill his wife?
I’m sure the marketers said Gone Girl “unearths the secrets at the heart of a modern marriage” to make the movie appeal to a wide audience. Because if they said the film “reveals the treachery of marriage to a psychopath,” people might be afraid to watch it.
Forgive me if I’m a bit vague in how I write about Gone Girl, but I don’t want to fill this post with spoilers for all of you who haven’t seen the movie yet.
From a purely entertainment perspective, the movie is good. It moved along quickly, held my interest, told a compelling story until the action just went way over the top.
I really liked the way the characters were portrayed. The attitude of the psychopath was absolutely on the money, and the reactions of the people around the psychopath were realistic.
This psychopath charmed, was temporarily satisfied, then plotted and schemed. The movie did a good job of illustrating the motivations and behavior of a highly disordered individual.
Gone Girl could have been a cautionary tale about the human predators who live among us. But then, about 80% of the way through the movie, there’s a plot twist that is just too messy, and I mean that literally. A real psychopath, especially one so smart and calculating, would have accomplished the objective without it looking like a horror movie.
At that point, the plausibility and realism were lost.
Even casual moviegoers start questioning the storyline. Why did they do this? Why didn’t they do that?
The vibe in the movie theater as Gone Girl came to an end was that it was typical Hollywood fare dramatic, shocking fiction. I doubt anyone believed that such a story could really happen.
Which is too bad, because much of what the movie portrayed could really happen to someone unlucky enough to tangle with a highly disordered psychopath.
The charm, manipulation, deceit, sense of entitlement, calculated plotting and chameleon-like ability to change personas that are depicted in Gone Girl are absolutely realistic. If the story were toned down just a little bit, you could send your families and friends to the movie so they could learn what you’ve been dealing with.
Sounds frighteningly real to me!
Donna,
I saw the movie and, like you, felt it portrayed pretty accurately (drawing from my own experience) what it is like to be married to a sociopath. That is until, the over the top part of the movie that you mentioned. As I watched the movie I was fascinated by her character, sort of the way I get fascinated when I’m looking at vipers at the zoo.
Sort of the way I was also fascinated (and appalled) by my ex husband’s manipulations.
The author of the book and screenplay clearly knew how sociopaths operate. But – the author tries to climb into the sociopath’s head and to show her POV, which I think, unless you are a sociopath, is impossible. It’s like having the POV of a robot or a cartoon character.
As a character, I found her completely repellant, and I did not want the film to introduce me to the inside of her head. No surprise.
A far more terrifying and affecting and true movie I think is: “We Need to Talk about Kevin” – with Tilda Swinton, as the mom of a sociopath. That story is told from her POV, one that I’m sure anyone who reads LoveFraud to try to work through the danger and bafflement of dealing with disordered people – can certainly relate to. Another film: “The Bad Seed” – with Patty McCormack as a child sociopath. “All about Eve” is another super subtle and dead on classic story about a “normal” person’s (Bette Davis) siege with a sociopath. “Single White Female” with Bridget Fonda and Jennifer Jason Leigh is another film.
Maybe a Sociopath film festival: movies as a safe way of experiencing these spaths – seeing the patterns and learning how they try to snare and destroy (emotionally and/or physically) the ones who love them or have affection for them. And there are always re-runs of “Leave it to Beaver” – Eddie Haskell is a sort of comic hatchling sociopath who torments the Beaver… Possible teaching tool…
“Spoiler Alert” — Oops, did you mean to give away which character was the psycho? — that the author was carefully not revealing for those who may not have seen the movie yet!
I had already found the story line online and knew what was going to happen. And, as the author describes, exactly what I thought just reading about it, it became a ridiculous plot!
Is it true, it will be an Oscar contender? — I guess for entertainment purposes, it made it’s mark. I will see it on the big screen even though I know what’s coming — hope I haven’t added to the ‘spoiler’.
awww now uve spoiled it for me lol
i’ll be trying to figure out who is the spath all the movie instead.
à knew it cudnt be the husband as theyve made it look as tho it was on the trailers.
i figured she had killed herself or disappeared tho. that, that was the twist.
ya never know with hollywood lol
You can find the info you seek on the web. IMDB gives all the info there and you’re not even close. 🙂
I just read a recently released book, “Match Dot Murder: A True Story” by Stan McDonald.” It’s the flip side of this story, well written and true. A male victim living in love with a female psychopath. They both talk of love and marriage, all the while she’s plotting his death. The attempt fails and courtroom drama follows. The victim unravels the puzzle of what happened and relates what three years living with a female black widow is like.
Psychopathy knows no gender, an often overlooked fact in our society. The book is a very interesting page turner. Website: http://www.matchdotmurder.com for a closer look.
You are very correct. I’ve had the unfortunate mishap of knowing both male and female psycho’s — they truly are the best of the best of human nature at it’s worst!! — and everyone of them is capable of the unthinkable because they have neither have nor feel emotion, as we the ‘normals’ (haha) do. Thanks for the suggested read — I plan to get it!
I just watched the trailer above and IMO the narration from the wife’ viewpoint is misleading to what the climax of the story brings…… I guess that’s Hollywood.
Jeanie,
I read the book a couple of years ago. That’s why the book was such a hit–it seemed as if one person was the psychopath when, in reality, the other one was. In the book, it was a major plot twist that I didn’t see coming until the end. The book was very realistic in how everything transpired and it explained how it could have happened in more depth than the movie did and it was very believable.
Much of the book’s dialogue happened in the minds of the characters, which doesn’t translate very well onscreen.
They were both sort of crazy. Only some more than others.
Seemed to me that they were both psychopaths to different degrees. Her parents were pretty disordered too.
Well, my husband and I watch about an hour of crime shows each night before going to sleep. The titles would work for bad beach novels. But these TV shows are not fiction. They are real stories, and they make Gone Girl look like a new title for just another Sociopathic crime show. The only thing that was Hollywood over-the-top to me was the way that everyone had a gorgeous face, perfect body, great haircuts, was well off, had impecably good taste in clothes, houses and cars and had tons of A-list friends. The plot twist occurred because of a turn in events which made the sociopath desperate. Desperate people do desperate things. Desperate sociopaths do evil, unbelievable over-the-top things and according to these tv shows they do them all over this country, every single week somewhere.
DonaldDraper in “Mad Men” could be the perfect tale of both a psychopath and rape by fraud. His persona was a total sham. John Hamm does an excellent job of portraying him. And the character of the wife was perfect when the revelation hit her. Draper is exactly the type of hoax that rape by fraud laws should be implemented for. It may be happening shortly in NY and NJ. I recently submitted language for the law and heard back that it is included in the legislation the Assemblyman who is presenting the new statute will be using in NJ.
If you were in a relationship with an imposter, please let me know and I’ll tell you where the law stands in your state. If you’re from TN, you’re lucky. It has the most specific rape by fraud law in the country.
For those of you who think there is no solution and that these predators can simply continue defiling people, stay tuned. Relief may be closer than you think!
Joyce
Hey Donna ! I went to see the movie and I agree with you it went way to crazy towards the end. I thought they were both spaths from the beginning. What we used to refer to as gasoline and fire. My xspath deserved an Oscar for his performance but I doubt this movie will win any awards.. I give it two thumbs down. Hope you and all the old LF gang are doing well……
Hens – good to hear from you! You’re always welcome to stop by!
After seeing Gone Girl twice, I offer the following review, particularly for those not too familiar with narcissists and psychopaths and the ways in which they create such huge destruction:
Gone Girl Review: How Wrong Was It?
Warning: Multiple SPOILERS. Based on the film, not the book.
The woman sitting behind me, on conclusion of the movie Gone Girl, said it well: “That was wrong on so many levels!”
As the movie ended, many sat stunned for a bit before leaving. I would bet I was one of the only ones in the crowded movie theater who had lived 25 years with a likely narcissistic psychopath, and who did not find the machinations of the wife, Amy, bizarre. Instead it was all too familiar, and more than a little triggering. I am reminded of many years ago, when I went to watch Burning Bed and a woman ran out of the theater gasping in tears, probably triggered, when it opened with a violent rape scene. I made myself sit through Gone Girl without melting down or running out of the theater. And it got intense.
In addition to being married to a probable strongly and malignantly narcissistic psychopath, I have worked with or done business with several. I have made it my business to learn the type.
And so I have some comments about the parts of Gone Girl that were so right — or so wrong ”“ unrealistic and may lead to misconceptions. Having said that, most of it was spot on, written and acted with direction that shows great understanding of the personality type and what they will do. Hopefully, Gone Girl will do for narcissistic personality disorder and psychopaths what Fatal Attraction did for the acting out form of borderline personality disorder.
What was right on? Narcissists and psychopaths don’t stop. They have multiple victims, victimized in similar ways. Sometimes over time they escalate as they gain experience and seek greater thrills. They leave a wake of destruction behind them. Narcissists and psychopaths often “hook” their victims so that they feel they cannot leave. This hook is often marriage or pregnancy after intense dream-come-true seduction.
In this movie, the husband who was victimized was also at his wife’s financial mercy as everything they had was in her name, including his business, and they had a pre-nuptial agreement that left him with little or nothing if he left. This is a form of financial abuse, as she tightened that noose and made it work against him. Secretly running up credit card debt is another way they financially abuse. Taking or taking control of money, or running up debt, secretively, is a common tactic they use.
They like attention and media focus. They like tricking and winning, especially if they can fool people. This is called duping delight. And sometimes, they are impulsively violent without warning, especially if they have been insulted, have much to gain, or someone is inconveniently in the way. They relish revenge. They love power over others.
So what was wrong? Here are my corrections:
Unrealistic parts? Psychopaths maintain their cool underneath whatever else they do, and do not become unbalanced as the wife, Amy, did. Perhaps the author intended her to imitate someone coming unhinged. That is something psychopaths do. They convincingly imitate other forms of mental illness when that is useful to them, as Robert Hare, psychopath researcher, found. Rarely, for brief periods, narcissists with severe NPD can become psychotic.
A strong narcissist or psychopath would not give almost a million dollars away. “Too bad for those that used to have it”, is their attitude, “it’s mine now”. Perhaps if Amy felt she would get the money back, she might, if it kept it away from her husband. Or perhaps she was in thrall to her own parents, who may have had personality issues of their own, as narcissism and psychopathy are often multi-generational. And a narcissist or psychopath would not go back to a normal husband, and leave a wealthy fish on the hook.
Lastly, Amy was played as very impassive, probably to show lack of empathy. But in real life, narcissists and psychopaths may be quiet, but are very charming and charismatic — more the center of the room, life of the party, the person people gravitate to and follow. Casual observers, and even people close to them, do not know what is going on behind their facade.
There may be debate about how realistic the very ending was. I won’t weigh in so as not to give it away, but I can see it either way, given the charisma, intense personal magnetism, and machinations of narcissistic psychopaths ”“ and the tales of woe and hypnotic attraction from real-life victims.
I hope this, combined with the NFL domestic violence situation, will bring more attention to issues of abuse, psychological dysfunction including personality disorders, victims’ needs, difficulty in figuring out who is the abuser and who is the victim, and law enforcement and legal handling of cases, not to mention media attention and portrayals; and show that both genders can be victims.
Gone Girl can be food for thought and increased understanding.
More analysis of Gone Girl, along with comments, can be found at:
Ms Magazine Blog article http://msmagazine.com/blog/2014/10/03/whats-missing-from-the-gone-girl-debate-privilege/ Facebook discussion of Gone Girl comments at https://www.facebook.com/msmagazine .
I like the idea of a “Spath Film Festival”. Don’t forget the plethora of Alfred Hitchcock films and TV shows that tended to feature psychopathic individuals and their deeds.
“Rope” and “Shadow of a Doubt” are two of the more creepy portrayals of psychopathy by Hitchcock. “Rope” is interesting for being shot as (virtually) one seamless take with no cuts; this was intended to make the viewer feel as though you’re watching real events unfolding in real time. The film was inspired by an actual shocking murder case from the 1920s.