Gone Baby Gone

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Damn it, I like Ben Affleck. I know he's been in some pretty shitty movies, but the dude's got a bad rap. Maybe he's not a great actor like his buddy Damon, but he's a good one who maybe just doesn't always pick the best movies.

Anyway, fuck all that, because we are now entering a new era of Affleck, whereby he regains his dignity by proving himself as a talented director. I love Gone Baby Gone, it's the best detective film in a long time, maybe since L.A. Confidential. If I made a top 10 list for 2007, it would have a respectable showing on it. I dug it enough when it came out that I thought I'd check out the book series it was based on, by Dennis Lehane.

Turns out that was a good call, because they are some highly entertaining, well-written detective books with some great characters. I'm already through the first three, Gone Baby Gone is the fourth and I plan on getting around to it soonish.

Thing is, though, I actually like Affleck's Gone Baby Gone better than any of the Lehane books I've read so far. He reigns in some of the more over-the-top elements of the book, and plays the story more intimate and realistic. Granted, I haven't read Gone Baby Gone yet, so it's possible that Lehane makes a few notable changes to the style in that one. But if I had to guess, I'd guess that it's more similar to the other books.

The problem with the books is the violence. The first book was also a little too self-consciously hip and badass, but I've noticed that happens to a lot of crime authors on their first book, and he seems to have cured himself of that for the other books.

Now, don't get me wrong, I like violence. Shit, love it. But once or twice in each book, the violence gets so over-the-top that it undermines the realism of the characters. Like at the end of the 2nd book, where the bad guy holds a baby hostage during a shootout. It's a little much. I mean, I know they are detective books with absurdly convoluted plots, but he does a great job of making the story feel plausible. Until he gets to a shootout or something, and suddenly everyone turns into the fucking Punisher, and maybe it tries a little too hard to seem cool and exciting.

There is violence in Affleck's film, but he saves it for choice moments and always makes it visceral and real, which gives it a lot more impact.

Affleck really gets the soul of Lehane's books perfectly, especially in how well he captures the moral complexity. I think the heart of most good detective fiction (that I'm familiar with, at least) is about characters having to take a hard look at who they are any what they believe. The story usually brings the hero to some moral line, and he either decides that it's the one line he won't cross, or sometimes when it's a more noir-ish tale, he crosses it and pays the consequences. Lehane does this as good as any other crime writer I've read, with his lead character making hard choices, and finding out surprising details about what he is capable of.

The movie is very much in that spirit, and perhaps halfway through the main character does something that, while shocking, we understand his motivations. But then the movie lingers on the implications, and shows his guilt and conflicted feelings. This would be a strong enough theme for a detective movie, but it turns out that it only sets the stage for an even bigger decision that he makes at the end of the film... and the movie has the balls to make it clear that it was very possibly the wrong decision, but is still so empathetic towards the hero that we understand exactly why he does what he does.

I guess I'm not shocked that this movie didn't get more love, but fuck. What more do you people want? This is a great detective film, I think perhaps a new classic.

I oughta pick this up on DVD at some point.