Crap Baby Crap

I saw "Gone Baby Gone" last night. The commercials for the DVD say "It'll leave you talking long after it's over," and they're right. Mostly you'll be saying, "Wow. That was a massive pile of crap."

Save yourself two hours and read this instead. Naturally, it gives away the end.

"Gone Baby Gone" opens with Police Captain Jack Doyle talking about poor little Amanda's abduction. "My own child was abducted years ago," he tells the press corps, "so I will really hunt for Amanda. I'm not saying I wouldn't have otherwise, but we'll never really know, right?"

NEWS ANCHOR: Little Amanda was last seen with her doll Mirabelle. Repeating: with her doll Mirabelle. So if you come across a lost little girl whose doll has a different name, just ignore her, please.

Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan run a detective agency. They're also soulmates who've known each other since they were young, but it'll take this kidnapping to prompt their first discussion about whether or not they want to have kids. In desperation, Amanda's aunt Bea turns to them for help.

MICHELLE: Let's not take the case. It's too depressing. Either we'll find Amanda dead, which is sad, or we'll find her alive with a child molester, which is even sadder.

CASEY: Remind me: you're a private detective exactly why?

Casey is from the hood, so people will talk to him who wouldn't talk to the cops. He goes to a bar where Amanda's mom Helene was a regular and discovers Helene did drugs with her boyfriend Ray in the bar's bathroom the very night of Amanda's disappearance. Various scary people twice Casey's size get pissed off about his prying, but he pulls a gun and/or pistol whips them. Though this is a small town and everybody knows where Casey lives, the next scene doesn't show anyone beating the crap out of him or burning down his house.

Casey and Michelle meet with Remy and Nick, two police officers, to swap information. Though the whole city is in turmoil, these are the only two guys actually working on the case. The others are evidently making sure all the yellow tape stays up.

After Ray is found dead, it's obvious Helene is hiding something. Casey and Michelle confront her and she admits she ran drugs for a Jamaican gangster named Cheese. (Me, I'd have made him Swiss.) She and Ray ripped him off for over a hundred thousand dollars. Casey and Michelle relate this story to Remy and Nick.

CASEY: Can we ask Cheese if he'll swap Amanda for the cash, PLEASE? We're from the hood, so he'll talk to us.

REMY: Buddy, all we've got going for us is the element of surprise. We've got exactly one shot at breaking Cheese, and if we blow it we're finished, Amanda's good as dead. But you two are amateur detectives, so if you want to, sure!

Cheese pleads ignorance. "Bitches love the Cheddar," he suddenly announces, making viewers wonder how they feel about Colby or Jack. Later that night, though, Casey and Michelle get a mysterious call agreeing to the exchange. They turn up at the old quarry (now a small lake) and all hell breaks loose. Shots are fired, Cheese is killed, and after a splash is heard, Amanda's doll is seen floating in the water.

CASEY: Well, that's it. Little Amanda is dead. Nobody saw her fall in, and it's a still body of water so she'd just sink straight down and stay there, but divers are expensive and we all heard the splash so I guess the case is closed.

Several months later, one of Casey's contacts drags him to a house where two drug fiends and a child molester are holed up. Casey suspected them of having Amanda, but obviously they weren't involved. They find the body of another missing child, though, so Casey shoots the unarmed molester in the back of the head. The police all agree it's cool so he's not detained.

Casey and Remy have a drunken talk where Remy admits to four hundred different crimes, contradicts eighteen things he said earlier, and talks about having a PlayStation back in 1962.

CASEY (thinking): Hmm. That's odd; they weren't invented until 1995. Could Remy have lied to me?

He questions Amanda's uncle Lionel at Helene's favorite bar, and Lionel spills the beans: It's the cops that took Amanda -- and she's alive! They wanted to save her from her crack-whore mom. While he's telling this to Casey, a masked burglar comes in and points a sawed-off shotgun at him. Casey immediately realizes it's not a robbery.

CASEY: He already told me that the cops took Amanda! I know! And since I'm yelling, everybody knows now! Don't kill him!

The bartender shoots the robber twice through the heart, and the mask falls off. It's Remy. He runs away, still armed, and Casey chases, making everybody wonder why he'd risk being injured when he could wait a couple minutes until the dude dies outside. Remy confirms his involvement with his dying breath, and Casey realizes Captain Jack is involved too. He's about to confront him when Michelle announces that she knew he took the girl.

MICHELLE: C'mon! Leave the man alone! Jesus wants us to steal attractive white children from drug-abusing hookers. We all know the system doesn't work, though if anybody'd talked to Child Protective Services at any point in the past Amanda would be in a foster home right now.

CASEY: Amanda belongs with her mother. I'm going to get her and bring her back.

MICHELLE: If you do, I'm leaving you. I'm going to move in with my sister.

The whole audience shudders. For the sister.

Casey does what he threatened, and the police arrest Captain Jack. In the last scene, Casey is with Helene and Amanda. Helene is dressed in hot pants and tank top for her usual coke whore's night out.

HELENE: Can you babysit for me? There's a biker I should be blowing right now.

CASEY: Sure. (Thinking to himself.) Did I do the right thing? Have I lost my soulmate? What kind of life is this for poor Amanda? Isn't there something we can do to save our children? They're our future, after all! (Aloud, to Amanda.) Hey, what's on TV?

FIN