Gone Girl

[Corvus]

I stumbled on this movie yesterday from last year starring Ben Affleck, was not expecting much but as the movie progressed and twisted it was obvious that [Spoiler Ahead!!] it was about one intelligent psychopathic women from higher standing that manipulated everyone and everything based on her popularity and mask she projected. Trying to fake her death to set up his husband for murder, showing obsessiveness, urge to control, vengefulness, looking like victim all the times and there was also a murder. It was very good movie, and it was even twice mentioned in the movie she is a psychopath. There was interesting scene when her mask of sanity falls before her husband from then on he does not sleep in their room anymore but in separate room locking his doors when he realized what a monster she is. Based on the evidence in the first part of the movie you think he killed his wife based on the evidence and his behavior(having lover) but then there is a twist for 180 degrees, but that is how probably majority of people would look at it as showed in the movie. In the end as it goes in reality he decided to stay with her because she is pregnant and manipulated him that if he goes the child will hate him, but it is questionable if the child will be even normal because of mothers psychopathic genes. It seems lately there are some good movies bringing to light psychopathy.

 

[Tigersoap]

I thought it was a good David Fincher movie with nice twists all along to keep it going.

I guess it also shows how media coverage can shape the opinion of people about someone accused of a crime for example, it's not only about a failed relationship.
It does not make marriage look attractive for sure

 

[lilyalic]

It's really interesting to see how psychopathic she turns out to be, and how it ties in with the social requirements of men and how they seek to please them. It's one of those jaw dropping films! really got me thinking when the film ended, it's crazy how she even manipulated reproducing with her husband and got herself pregnant, and then he seems to have this underlying wish to stay with her to the end anyway.

I thought it was a good David Fincher movie with nice twists all along to keep it going.

I guess it also shows how media coverage can shape the opinion of people about someone accused of a crime for example, it's not only about a failed relationship.
It does not make marriage look attractive for sure

The twists were massive! there were assumptions straight up that it could have been her, but definitely more towards his side.
Yeah it's a good example of how the media shapes our opinions and how being brought up with fame and grandiosity shapes the personality.

 

[Blackiris]

I love the way the audience is deceived by this psychopath and views her the way everyone else in the movie does before they see her for what she really is. I actually believed Ben Affleck's charecter was the murderer almost halfway into the movie. My husband and i watched it a few weeks ago. I'm glad we have such movies that will get people to think twice before trusting such psychopaths AND the media. 2 huge topics have been covered here.

 

[Jenn]

Hi I was really surprised with this movie too(In a good way) I liked how they used the full term psychopath, I found it really tense and shocking!!! and captivating too. I was disappointed at the end that he went back to her as we were led to believe he may actually want to be with her, not just for the baby. However I think it's probably a pretty realistic depiction of what a relationship may be like with a psychopath- how easily they can manipulate people. Also the fact that she was female was interesting :) I would recommend watching this movie...

 

[patty2292]

Very good film indeed! Before watching it, i had the sense that i new what was going to happen and it was clearly obvious Ben Afflec or a 3rd party was the cause of all the drama. Not a slight hint was given in the trailer that it centered around Rosamund Pike being a psychopath.
Being a rather long film, it is slow towards the start. Especially when jumping to a conclusion on the ending before the juicy bits start to develop.
But once the twist started revealing itself, it grabbed me fully.
A very brilliant way that this film portrait a female psychopath.
Has anyone read the book? If so are there any comparisons or similarities to the representations used on psychopathy?

 

[lilies]

Rosamund Pike managed to give me such creeps in this otherwise excellent movie that I shuddered when seeing her on the poster of "Hector and the Search for Happiness" and immediately decided I won't watch another movie, where she stars. :) Wondering, how much time, till this effect goes away. Before Gone Girl I recently re-watched American Psycho and it deeply affected me, because of recommended readings, plus news watch. Was expecting Gone Girl a boring movie and it turned out everything else.

 

[Approaching Infinity]

A bit of text from the writer, Gillian Flynn. She wrote the novel, then adapted it herself for the screen. Apparently there's a bit of controversy that the film/novel is sexist. I think that's horse hockey, but here's some context from Flynn that I think is interesting, especially given the topics here discussing female psychopathy.

_http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/01/gillian-flynn-bestseller-gone-girl-misogyny

To me, that puts a very, very small window on what feminism is," she responds. "Is it really only girl power, and you-go-girl, and empower yourself, and be the best you can be? For me, it's also the ability to have women who are bad characters … the one thing that really frustrates me is this idea that women are innately good, innately nurturing. In literature, they can be dismissably bad – trampy, vampy, bitchy types – but there's still a big pushback against the idea that women can be just pragmatically evil, bad and selfish ... I don't write psycho bitches. The psycho bitch is just crazy – she has no motive, and so she's a dismissible person because of her psycho-bitchiness.
...
My point is not that I was an odd kid (although looking at this on paper now, I worry). Or that I was a bad kid (here’s where I tell you — for the sake of my loving parents — that I had enjoyed happy wonder years back in good old Kansas City). But these childhood rites of passage — the rough-housing, the precocious sexuality, the first bloom of power plays — really don’t make it into the oral history of most women. Men speak fondly of those strange bursts of childhood aggression, their disastrous immature sexuality. They have a vocabulary for sex and violence that women just don’t. Even as adults. I don’t recall any women talking with real pleasure about masturbating or orgasms until Sex and the City offered its clever, cutie-pie spin, presenting the phrases to us in a pre-approved package with a polka-dot bow. And we still don’t discuss our own violence. We devour the news about Susan Smith or Andrea Yates — women who drowned their children — but we demand these stories be rendered palatable. We want somber asides on postpartum depression or a story about the Man Who Made Her Do It. But there’s an ignored resonance. I think women like to read about murderous mothers and lost little girls because it’s our only mainstream outlet to even begin discussing female violence on a personal level. Female violence is a specific brand of ferocity. It’s invasive. A girlfight is all teeth and hair, spit and nails — a much more fearsome thing to watch than two dudes clobbering each other. And the mental violence is positively gory. Women entwine. Some of the most disturbing, sick relationships I’ve witnessed are between long-time friends, and especially mothers and daughters. Innuendo, backspin, false encouragement, punishing withdrawal, sexual jealousy, garden-variety jealousy — watching women go to work on each other is a horrific bit of pageantry that can stretch on for years.

Libraries are filled with stories on generations of brutal men, trapped in a cycle of aggression. I wanted to write about the violence of women.

 

[Seaniebawn]

Jesus I just watched the Movie :O, don't really know what to say, profile of a female psychopath

 

[trytofly]

A good film about a psychopathic profile.
It also demonstrates the difficulty of escaping the grip of a psychopath.
Like what, it is better to avoid them before it's too late. Hence the importance of identified them fairly quickly.

 

[zulhelmi]

I enjoyed watching the movie. I must admit if I didn't read many sott's articles on psycopathy and books, I would get very confused trying to 'understand' the characters.

 

[Niall]

I enjoyed watching the movie. I must admit if I didn't read many sott's articles on psycopathy and books, I would get very confused trying to 'understand' the characters.

Exactly. I think we need a reality-check here on the idea that these movies are attempting to 'educate the masses about psychopathy'. What if the (overall) effect is in fact to normalize psychopathy?

No matter how artsy, hip, and intellectual they made this film appear to be, it contains graphic and gratuitous sex and violence, just like (nearly) all the others.