Real Gone

A couple of mainstream, and fairly decent, offerings:

GONE GIRL (B+) - It's a shame that a person can't enjoy the book and the movie equally. Some folks out there are coming to the movie fresh and probably enjoying the hell out of it. Those of us who loved the book can appreciate the thriller's adaptation, even though we know all of the twists in advance.

David Fincher, as usual, is technically adept but lacking in heart. He creates a mood and churns the story, but there's little thrill or delight in the movie as a whole. In other words, despite a screenplay from the novelist, Gillian Flynn, "Gone Girl" isn't the page-turner it is in print.

Rosamund Pike stars as Amy Dunne, the New Yorker yanked by her husband to Missouri, only to go missing on their fifth anniversary amid signs of foul play. Ben Affleck, workmanlike, is nonetheless slightly off-cast as her husband, Nick, who follows the clues Amy left for him, as she did every year on their anniversary. Affleck's everyman quality lacks that certain indefinable edge that Nick had in the book, despite the first key twist that exposes a character flaw.

The cast is strong, but Fincher fails to draw sublime performances out of them. Pike is the weak link of the first half. She brings nothing special to the character of Amy, and Fincher seems to be doing something to her voice on the soundtrack, making it dreamlike, as if Pike's voice is dubbed. Carrie Coon (in the role that used to be filled by Janeane Garafolo) plays Nick's snarky but sympathetic twin sister, Margo, and she finds nuance here, as she did in HBO's dull "Leftovers." Tyler Perry is serviceable but nothing special as the shady celebrity lawyer who defends Nick, the suspect in his wife's disappearance. Kim Dickens is delightful but somewhat cliched as the hard-ass detective on Nick's case. Affleck (in a role that used to be played by ... Ben Affleck) hits his marks but overdoes the bland side of Nick. Lola Kirke lights up the screen as a sexy, scheming trailer-park denizen. Missi Pyle sinks her teeth into the giddy Nancy Grace role of the haughty cable news scold. (The media circus, in general, comes off as too much of a caricature.)

By the time Neil Patrick Harris arrives to ham it up as Amy's old friend/stalker, Desi, the narrative starts to strain credulity, and the run time -- two and a half hours -- draws a bit of attention to itself. The subsequent twists aren't quite as scrumptious when splayed on the big screen, but they qualify as solid entertainment, and there's no denying that this has broad appeal. It might even seem compelling to those new to the story.

If not transcendent, it's often a lot of fun.

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS (B) - Shailene Woodley doesn't have to have cancer to make us want to weep just watching her act. She's endlessly appealing, and she's the main reason that this manipulative little weeper doesn't devolve into slushy schmaltz.

This Millennial "Love Story" is fairly predictable but not without its charms. It's not a little thing to watch a young Hollywood actress wear oxygen tubes on her face, throughout an entire film. Woodley is Hazel, a high-schooler suffering from a terminal form of lung cancer. At a support group meeting (hosted with goofy Christian enthusiasm by comedian Mike Birbiglia) she meets Gus, a pretty boy who lost his right leg to cancer but who now is apparently disease-free.

Gus (newcomer Ansel Elgort) is silver-screen perfect, and he and Hazel are beyond cute as a couple. In one of the more fetching touches, she calls him Augustus and he ritualistically calls her Hazel Grace. They develop a quaint secret-couple word: "Okay." And they bond over her favorite book, about a dying girl, a novel that ends in mid-sentence.

They are determined to visit the American author exiled in Amsterdam to ask him to explain the book's ending. They want to make the trip while Hazel is still healthy enough to do so. Eventually they make it to the apartment of Van Houten, a stereotypical drunken and bitter writer, expertly rendered by Willem Dafoe. That meeting goes poorly, but the Amsterdam trip is magical for the smitten teens. A trip to Anne Frank's home is quite moving; we watch as Hazel lugs her oxygen tank up to the attic, and we swoon when Hazel and Gus embrace amid the tourists.

The film is less weepy and more clever than I expected. But the dialogue is just too precious. The supporting characters don't fare so well. Laura Dern has a thankless role as Hazel's nerve-racked mother. Nat Wolff ("Palo Alto") plays the cliched sassy best pal who is dumped by his slutty girlfriend and is losing his sight.

Writers Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber definitely know how to tell a story. They crafted the disappointing but well received "(500) Days of Summer" as well as the winning Woodley vehicle "The Spectacular Now." This script has a natural rhythm, and it dabbles in the profound. The miserable writer conveys to the kids the concept of gradations of the infinite, and the characters echo that idea at the end, searching for infinite existence in the many moments in their numbered days.

It's a lovely thought. And Woodley, a seriously authentic actor, sells this maudlin shtick.