Thunderstorms, Bake Off and Cinema In The Afternoon (Gone Girl)

Last night we had a terrific storm. Around 10pm there was a massive clap of thunder overhead and the electricity went off. Immediately I was covered in frightened Bulldog and worried Scottish terrier. Even Albert hurried over to sit on the back of my chair.
minutes later the electricity came on again, but the surge must have played havoc with the tv, for it was dead as a dodo.
At least I managed to watch Bake Off before the tv imploded........it was the final last night, so there was much emailing back and forth with my nephew's partner on who was going to win.
The final had the bookmakers' favourite, the pencil-behind-the-ear Richard, pitched against the straight talking Nancy and the flamboyant and confident Luis and surprisingly it was Nancy who pulled her baking out of the bag to win.

she was a worthy winner, a good old fashioned baker. Dependable and consistent.
Wednesday's will be just a little more drab without it all.
 Yesterday afternoon me and the sister in law went to the cinema..... She wanted to see the new Helen Mirren but it wasn't showing so I talked her into seeing the "adult" thriller Gone Girl..which she was upset to see was an 18 certificate.
"I never see anything but U films" she said
As it turned out the David Fincher film was an inspired choice for it proved to be an intelligent noir thriller worthy of anything Hitchcock or dePalma  could have churned out.
I wont attempt to precis the complicated and clever plot, suffice to say the film seesaws around the disappearance of a beautiful young wife of a disillusioned, former golden boy in a recession hit mid western town. Did her husband kill his wife? Did the wife stage the whole thing? what was the true nature of their relationship? the film keeps the audience guessing to the very last reel and does so in a glossy, intelligent and surprisingly classy way/ It's a very smart movie.
Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike are wonderfully ambiguous as the couple, and the two leads are backed up beautifully by the likes of Carrie Coon , as Affleck's feisty twin sister. .Kim Dickens as a wily police detective and Tyler Perry as a big shot New York lawyer.

Gone Girl is not just a modern thriller of some class........it also has quite a lot to say about the reality of marriage........marriage  behind closed doors!
8/10

47 comments:

  1. THANKS for letting us know your thoughts about "Gone Girl." I really want to see it, but don't know of anyone who has--It's getting mixed reviews here.

    Is there a new TV in your future?

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    1. Kim, just bought one......it's been an expensive day

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  2. I hope Rachel did go to that film insted of cleaning the walls.

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    1. And I enjoyed the film very much. Thanks for encouraging me to go John.

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  3. My money was on Luis to win Bake-Off -- his creations are always so artistic and beautiful, and I thought he'd be a good dark-horse choice. But I'm happy with Nancy, too. I knew Richard was too easy.

    I just read "Gone Girl," so I'm not sure I'll run out and see the movie right away, but I certainly hope you're wrong about it portraying marriage behind closed doors. I hope NO ONE's marriage is that screwed up, even in private!

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    1. Of course they were an exageration but I think the film was a nod to all those people who exist in a loveless marriage

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  4. Good! Nancy won! She wears Hull City bloomers under her apron and is Yorkshire through and through. She has only lived in Barton for a few years and it is just across the Humber Bridge from Hull. No way is she from Lincolnshire. What a terrible slur!

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  5. I would have been happy for any of them to win. They were all thoroughly good eggs! I read Gone Girl so glad to hear that the film was a reasonable adaptation. Hopefully most people's marital disharmony is of the who left the toothpaste lid off variety than that portrayed by the film!

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    1. I never read the book...I think I need to give it a go

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  6. Quite fancy 'Gone Girl'. Although Rosamund does look a tiny bit dead in the pic above, hope that's not a spoiler John?
    Jean
    x

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    1. Don't worry Jean its a publicity photo

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  7. We had the lightning here in Ireland, John. No electric for several hours and the land line's gone for the third time this year.

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    1. Did your tele blow up like ours did......I've just forked out 124 quid for a new one

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  8. They call come to you for protection.

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  9. We have loved the programme too - but the huge show stopper was something quite technically mindblowing!

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  10. Have read Gone Girl, which I quite enjoyed despite some rather implausible twists, so I'm looking forward to seeing the film. As the others say, I hope the reality of marriage is usually a bit less bizarre and dramatic than that in the book.

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  11. My potential Top 10 films of this year is already getting awfully crowded. I just don't want to leave ANY of them out, and to have a Top TWENTY just for 2014 would be bizarre. However, 'Gone Girl' will have no difficulty at all in being in the uppermost 5.

    Btw: Thanks for you comment on my own review. I've suitably acknowledged it there.

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  12. I never considered that you'd have a different film rating system than our own. It sounds as idiosyncratic as your school structure. Good for Ben Affleck that he's found his way back to some quality filmmaking.

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    1. He's a talented actor....and I loved his Argo too....he's very good in gone girl

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    2. Ben Affleck started to regain his star status back in 2010 with the very smart film he directed called The Town. It pulled him out of the mire he slumped into with J. Low and that awful Jersey Girl phase.

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  13. Read the book; can't wait to see the movie. Large thunderstorm knocked a limb on my husband's car the other night which knocked out the back windshield and a few dents. Insurance (the downfall of our society) says it will be nearly $5000. to fix. It is such a racket and that tree is coming down.

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    1. Well I can't really moan about a 150£ tv can I?

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  14. I read about half of Gone Girl. I returned it to the library unfinished. I didn't want to spend another minute with those horrible, screwed up people, even if it was fiction.
    We had a golden retriever whose teeth would chatter when there was thunder. It took us a moment to figure out what the clicking sound was. It was Sampson's teeth.

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    1. Lol.....WINNIE has no teeth..so no chatter

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  15. Still on the fence about Gone Girl. We'll probably wait until DVD.

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  16. Okay. Okay. Maybe I will go see it by myself. Husband likes the "blow 'em up, monster chase, end of the world" type movies.

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    1. It was a treat to go with my sister in law.... I too usually go alone

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  17. Can't wait to see it myself!

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  18. I haven't read Gone Girl. It's highly praised. I look forward to reading it and seeing the movie. I think Ben Afflec is more multi-faceted than I once believed.

    Love,
    Janie

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    1. Apparantly he flashed his knob too in the movie... But I blinked and missed it

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    2. He was on a talk show the other day and he said he wanted it on the record that his "knob" had only a minor role & the appearance was brief. At least he can joke about himself.

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    3. Anonymous1:36 am

      I missed the knob as well.

      I have the book right here. I want to know what kind of crazy that chick was. Not your garden variety kind of crazy...scary crazy.

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  19. Rachel liked it too, I read. You should have gone together.

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  20. I have just read about this on Rachel's blog too.
    Yes - I really hoped that Richard would win, but on the night he really went to pieces a bit (curdling his citron tarts!!!) and I do think Nancy was a worthy winner, although I though all three of those final monstrosities were awful. I don;t think \i could bring myself to eat red icing.

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    1. Yes the last cakes were bloody awful

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  21. Kali and I saw "Gone Girl" last weekend. We both liked it, but I enjoyed it more than Kali did. I think you did a good job of describing the film without giving too much away, John. Apparently, the film is "darker" than the book (which I didn't read), but I could see how it could have been made as a black comedy, too. Our biggest complaint: at 2:24, it's 15-30 minutes too long. Also, why the hell didn't they wash the blood off Amy in the hospital before they sent her home; I know YOU would never have let her go home from your hospital like that!

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    1. We discussed that ..I suspect that the character of Amy would have insisted that she do that at home.......it making a big impact on the press as she left

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    2. Yes, the film is darker than the book. It is good for that.

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  22. Off to read the book again! Nancy shone by miles!

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  23. I had to go out to a 'puppy party' with Charley so I had left the tele on for the dogs and set the Freesat box up to record Bake Off. I was horrified when I stepped back into the house a couple of hours later to hear the words '...and the winner is....' NEVER have I ran so fast through the house to turn over the channel.

    Then me and the dogs sat huddled together on the sofa as the storm thundered all around the house and watched the final with a glass of wine (me not them).

    A well deserved win, but they were all brilliant and the Extra Slice programme rounded it all off nicely.

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  24. I was thinking of going to see Gone Girl this weekend and with your review, I will definitely have it on my schedule.

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