Anatomy of a great scene: Gruesome discovery in Gone Baby Gone
You’ve probably heard the news. The 1998 detective novel Gone, Baby, Gone is being turned into TV series. Yes, the bestselling book by Dennis Lehane just got a pilot order by Fox and it will be written by Levine, himself. The untitled one-hour drama will center on a pair of private detectives, Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro trying to solve the tough cases in the rough neighborhoods of Boston.
Back in 2007, Gone baby Gone was turned into a neo-noir mystery drama film, that was directed by Ben Affleck and starred his younger brother Casey and Michelle Monaghan in the lead roles. The directorial debut of Ben Affleck, was critical and commercial success and even received an Academy award nomination (for best supporting actress- Amy Ryan) but I’d love to talk about one particular scene in that movie.
One great scene. The scene that made an impression on me, and still makes me sick to my stomach every time I see it. The gruesome discovery scene. Yeah, the whole movie is brilliant, and finely crafted piece of art but that particular scenes really gives you a better understanding of 2 things.
1. How talented director is Ben Affleck (even in his directorial debut)
2. How great of an actor his younger brother Casey really is.
The scene starts with a raid in the suspect’s house after finding evidence of the abducted boy is being held there. Casey’s character Patrick manages to escape to the second floor of the house but what he will find there, will actually force him to lose his lunch. As Patrick slowly walks into the bathroom, on the way there he will find the pedophile in a curled up position and the dead body of the child in question. Here’s the kicker. Ben manages to extract a mix of feelings with the use of the camera and good smart editing in that particular scene without even single uttered word from the lead character.
Ben slowly builds the climax of the scene (first with showing of the bloody underwear in the sink… than with the soap near the bathtub). Those shots give you hints of what is to come (aka The gruesome discovery) and they are prepping you for the worst. By now you’re so far on the edge of your seat and so disgusted with what you’re going to see, that you applaud at Patrick’s decision to (spoiler) kill the pedophile. You feel sad, and sick, and distraught after what you saw, but somehow you feel great after he kills that pedo with a single shot to his sick degenerated head.
Somehow justice is served, but you’re not even remotely satisfied because there is a dead innocent child in that very same room. So in honor of the announced pilot of Gone Baby Gone, I want you to take a look at this gruesome but fantastically crafted scene.
