Gone Mom

In a surprising twist, Gone Girl is quickly becoming the new Mother/Daughter film for the fall. Why you ask? I’m not all that sure. Just before it came out my own mom made me swear I’d see it with her, we still haven’t gotten around to it but not for lack of trying. All over Facebook though I’m seeing posts from people heading out to or coming back from seeing it with their own mothers. It’s not the stereotypical route for sure, but it’s interesting to see how this appears to a range of women. I have yet to see the film or read the book, but most of us know the basic elements of the story. Something about this woman, this flawed, crazed, hard-to-love woman is bringing the rest of us in en masse. It’s not just that it’s well written, There Will Be Blood was well written and dark and you didn’t see that becoming the new Sunday brunch+movie date, which this is quickly becoming. Rosamund Pike is playing a character, one just as layered, complicated, and nuanced as Daniel Day Lewis or any of the other plethora of male characters we see daily.

There’s an idea amongst (mostly male) reviewers that women want to see “good” women, even in raunchy comedies like Bridesmaids, which was a huge hit across the gender gap, it is essentially a story of friendship. Male characters like Don Draper, Walter White, or Tony Soprano can be dark anti-heroes, they’re not good people by any means, but we all tune in to watch. I look forward to seeing more female characters like Amy Dunne, not shrieking harpies or killjoys, but intelligent, cunning, manipulative, and vindictive – and I’ll be taking my mother to each of those movies as well.

Who did you see it with?

-Eleanor