Gone Baby Gone

Gone Baby Gone is a 2007 American neo-noir mystery drama film directed by Ben Affleck. In his feature-length directorial debut, Affleck co-wrote the screenplay with Aaron Stockard based on the novel Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane. The film stars Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan as two private investigators hunting for a little girl who was abducted from the Boston neighborhood of Dorchester. The supporting cast includes Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris and Amy Ryan.

Released on October 19, 2007, the film was well-received by critics and grossed $34.6 million worldwide against its $19 million budget. Ben Affleck was lauded for his directing debut by many critic organizations, and Amy Ryan received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Plot
Boston P.I. Patrick Kenzie and his partner/girlfriend Angie Gennaro witness a televised plea by a woman named Helene McCready for the return of her missing daughter Amanda, who was abducted with her favorite doll "Mirabelle". Patrick and Angie are then hired by the child's aunt Beatrice to find Amanda. Using his connections in the Boston crime underground, Patrick discovers that Helene and her boyfriend "Skinny Ray" were drug mules for a local Haitian drug lord named Cheese and had recently stolen over $130,000 from him. After tracking down Ray and discovering he has been murdered by Cheese's men, Patrick and Angie join police detectives Remy Bressant and Nick Poole in investigating the case. Patrick meets with Cheese and tries to negotiate the return of Cheese's stolen money for Amanda, but Cheese initially denies his involvement in the girl's disappearance. Police Captain Jack Doyle later reads Patrick a telephone transcript of the drug lord calling into the station to set up an exchange for Amanda. The exchange at a nearby quarry in Quincy is botched after a gunfight breaks out, killing Cheese. It is believed that Amanda fell in the quarry and drowned in the confusion; her doll is retrieved from the water and returned to Helene. Doyle, whose own daughter was killed years before, takes responsibility for the death and goes into early retirement following public outcry over the mishap.

Two months later, a seven-year-old boy is abducted in Everett and Patrick receives information that the boy was taken by Corwin Earle, a known child molester. After entering the suspect's house and finding evidence of the abducted boy, Patrick returns with Remy and Nick late at night to rescue him. A shootout ensues with the residents and Nick is fatally wounded. Patrick enters the house and finds the boy's dead body; he then shoots the surrendering Corwin in the back of the head in a fit of rage. Trying to alleviate Patrick's guilt, Remy confides that he once planted evidence on someone with the help of "Skinny Ray" — whom he had initially told Patrick he didn't know. After Nick's funeral, Patrick speaks to Devin, a police officer, who tells him that Remy had known about Cheese's stolen money before Cheese knew it was missing. Patrick then questions Beatrice's husband Lionel in a bar and pieces together that Lionel and Remy had conspired to stage a fake kidnapping in order to take the drug money for themselves and to teach Helene a lesson. At that point, Remy (trying to cover for his earlier mistake) enters the bar wearing a latex mask and holding a shotgun, staging a robbery to interrupt the conversation. Patrick realizes Remy plans to kill him and Lionel to keep them quiet, but the bartender shoots Remy twice in the back. Remy flees and is pursued by Patrick to the rooftop of a nearby building, where he succumbs to his wounds.

Patrick is questioned by the police about Remy's death and learns that the police never had a phone transcript like the one that Doyle had read to him prior to the botched exchange. The police dismiss his claims of Remy's corruption as conspiracy theory and Patrick does not press the issue further. Patrick and Angie drive to Doyle's home, where Patrick finds Amanda alive and well with Doyle and his wife. Doyle was part of the kidnapping all along and helped set up the fake exchange to frame Cheese and throw Patrick off the scent. Patrick threatens to call the authorities, but Doyle attempts to convince him that Amanda is better off living with them than with her neglectful mother, and that is reason enough to not get involved. Patrick leaves and discusses the choices with Angie, who says she will leave him if he calls the police, since she also believes Amanda is much better off with the Doyles. However, Patrick believes Amanda's mother can change and she shouldn't be denied her child, and calls the police; Doyle and Lionel are arrested, Amanda is returned to her mother amidst heavy publicity, and Patrick and Angie break up.

Patrick later visits Amanda as Helene is about to leave for a date. Helene informs Patrick that Beatrice has been forbidden to visit and is upset about Lionel's arrest. Patrick volunteers to watch Amanda, who is holding her old doll and watching television. Patrick asks Amanda about Mirabelle, only to hear Amanda inform him that her doll's name is "Annabelle" — implying that Helene did not even know the name of her daughter's favorite toy. As the film ends, Patrick stares at the television with Amanda.

Cast

 * Casey Affleck as Patrick Kenzie
 * Michelle Monaghan as Angie Gennaro
 * Morgan Freeman as Captain Jack Doyle
 * Ed Harris as Detective Sergeant Remy Bressant
 * John Ashton as Detective Nick Poole
 * Amy Ryan as Helene McCready
 * Madeline O'Brien as Amanda McCready
 * Amy Madigan as Beatrice "Bea" McCready
 * Titus Welliver as Lionel McCready
 * Slaine as Bubba Rogowski
 * Edi Gathegi as Cheese
 * Mark Margolis as Leon Trett
 * Michael K. Williams as Devin
 * Jill Quigg as Dottie

Production
Filming took place on site in Boston (mainly South Boston) and extras were often local passers-by. Other locations used include the former Quincy Quarries.

Release
Released on October 19, 2007, the film grossed $20.3 million in the U.S. and Canada and $14.3 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $34.6 million against its $19 million budget.

The UK release was originally set for December 28, 2007, but was pushed back to June 6, 2008, due to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. The Malaysian release was originally set for September 20, 2007, but was postponed to March 27, 2008, due to the kidnapping and murder of eight-year-old Nurin Jazlin.

Critical reception
The film garnered a positive reception from critics and audiences. The movie won an assortment of awards, including Best First Film for Casey Affleck from the Austin Film Critics Association. , the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported 94% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 173 reviews, with an average rating of 7.7/10. The critical consensus states that "Ben Affleck proves his directing credentials in this gripping dramatic thriller, drawing strong performances from the excellent cast and bringing working-class Boston to the screen." The review aggregator Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 72 out of 100, based on 34 reviews.

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone raved "The brothers Affleck both emerge triumphant in this mesmerizing thriller," while the New York Post called it "a twisty, morally ambiguous and satisfying neo-noir." Patrick Radden Keefe criticized the film for overstating the case in an otherwise laudable attempt to "capture Boston in all its sordid glory," writing that "The result is not so much what Mean Streets did for New York as what Deliverance did for Appalachia."

In the U.K., Gone Baby Gone received extremely positive reviews, including a five-star rating from Chris Tookey of the Daily Mail.

Ryan's performance in particular was singled out for acclaim, resulting in wins for the Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress and National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress, as well as nominations for the Academy Award, Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award.

In an issue of Vrij Nederland, Dutch critic and writer Arnon Grunberg called the book good, but the movie better, saying "Gone Baby Gone might not be a perfect film, but it's definitely an important one, if only to raise the question: 'What is home?'"

Top 10 lists
The film appeared on 65 critics' top ten lists of the best films of 2007.
 * 2nd – Christy Lemire, Associated Press
 * 4th – Ben Lyons, The Daily 10
 * 6th – Richard Roeper, At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper
 * 6th – Michael Medved, The Best and Worst of 2007
 * 7th – James Berardinelli, ReelViews
 * 8th – Noel Murray, The A.V. Club
 * 9th – Keith Phipps, The A.V. Club

Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on February 12, 2008. Extras include an audio commentary by Ben Affleck and Aaron Stockard, deleted scenes, and two behind-the-scenes featurettes. The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray in Australia on September 10, 2008, in which the ending depicts Monaghan's character imploring Affleck's character to return the child to her biological mother.

Soundtrack
The soundtrack to Gone Baby Gone was released on October 16, 2007.