This review contains SPOILERS for Gone Girl.
When I offered to write an “alternate take” on Gone Girl, I had no idea how specific my “take” on this film would be. See, in the film, Rosamund Pike’s character, married to Ben Affleck’s, goes missing on their anniversary, July 5th. It just so happens that this past Summer, on July 5th, I married my wife, Naomi, meaning that our anniversary is the same as the highly dysfunctional couple portrayed in the film. In another odd coincidence, the film concludes on August 4th, which happens to be my birthday. All this to say, it was a rather discomforting experience watching this movie with my wife and trying not to read ourselves into the characters on the screen despite these few outrageous similarities. The movie starts on their fifth anniversary, and the couple has grown completely apart and can’t stand each other.
Luckily, the movie takes a turn into less comparable territory, with its murders and mystery and twists and turns. The first half, before the turn, might have had us squeamish; seeing the couple have disagreements that sound like some of ours, or recognizing some of their early attractions while seeing them years later so far apart. The second half actually undoes much of what was seen before, and you learn that some of what you watched was even fiction.
This is not to eschew the film’s point. My colleagues have been quick to point out that David Fincher’s view of humanity is quite low, and this movie suggests that there is no such thing as selfless love. There are only people lying to each other and themselves and trying to control each other and gain the upper hand. In this film, and in Fincher’s other works, the most successful couples are the ones that simply agree they are using each other and are honest about it (The Underwoods on House of Cards, for example).
My colleagues, Andy Singleterry and Elijah Davidson, have also been quick to point out that this is not a Christian worldview, and have found contention with the film’s ethos (even if they enjoyed the film, as I also did), claiming that selfless love and marriage is possible, and that Christ was the ultimate example of selfless love and empowers us to live this way also.
I don’t disagree… completely.
Let’s look at this from a different perspective. Our first impulse is to look at David Fincher’s worldview and reject it “Christianly.” But honestly, we would probably lose the debate. Fincher seems to suggest in his movies that true selflessness is impossible; and we counter that people do selfless things all the time. But how many actions of your own can you truly, with a clear conscience, say were entirely selfless?
For example, to cite my own marriage, I recently gave my wife her birthday present. I’m a pretty good gift giver, and this time was no exception. I gave her something that made her cry the-good-kind-of-tears, something she couldn’t guess for two weeks as the box sat in our living room, and that I knew months ago I would buy her and she would love. She, among others, would consider this gift a selfless act of love… but, I also got something out of it. In many ways, my effort and thought did benefit me; she felt more love towards me, and that makes me feel good. I also get to take pride in being a good gift-giver.
In the same way, even religion makes it so that “doing the right thing when nobody can see you” can actually be an act of self-fulfillment. God sees you, and you are being somehow cosmically rewarded. Even without religion, any selfless act identified as such is self-gratifying even if no-one else knows. You feel pretty good about yourself for doing it, and feeling like a good person is a sure-fire way to help navigate the harsh realities of life. So, is there truly a selfless act to be done in a world like ours?
I borrow the following idea from Peter Rollins. In Matthew 6, Jesus says this strange thing: “When you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” Rollins similarly discusses, as I have, how seemingly impossible it is to do a selfless act. But what he suggests, interpreting this verse, is that the only truly selfless act is when one does good without even realizing it; and this only comes from practice.
Jesus is saying, “You should cultivate the kind of life and heart that giving to the needy, or doing any kind of good, selfless act, isn’t even a second thought; you don’t even realize that you did it.” And I would argue that this only happens by practicing doing it, even if you can’t escape the selfish reasons deep down that may motivate your actions.
I bet we’ve all had experiences where someone told us about something we did or said that was incredibly impacting for them, and we don’t even remember doing or saying it; or if we do, we didn’t realize the moment was so charged with potential. These are the moments where true selflessness occurs, and it only comes from trying to be selfless even when it’s impossible. Buying my wife the best gift I can imagine may not be selfless; but it’s a step towards believing that there can be and is selflessness in our marriage that will be fostered and kindled through hard work and effort.
So to find my way back to the movie, Gone Girl‘s message might actually be an important one. Perhaps we can actually cede that selflessness, in humanity, in marriage, is impossible, or at least unlikely. Fincher’s works are case studies; distressing, violent, extreme examples of what happens if his theory is true and we simply give in to it. But we can all, perhaps even Fincher, admit that we don’t want to have the marriage in Gone Girl, the life of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, or the friendships in The Social Network. Fincher might be right about us. But is it worth admitting it?
Would anyone want to live in a world where we would concede that this? The key to disagreeing with Fincher’s worldview is not simply to argue that he’s wrong, but to actually practice what it would be like if he were wrong, instead of giving in to it and facing the dark world we see in his works. It might be more intellectually honest to give in, but it would hardly be good. I would rather live in a world pretending to be selfless than in a world that has given up on the notion.
So what do we do? We believe, pretend, have faith (whatever you want to call it) that selflessness is real, and we try our absolute hardest to act like it. And in the process of doing so, we might accidentally commit a selfless act or two, and, in community, commit to make the world a better place than we found it; and certainly a better place than if we were to act otherwise.
You might also enjoy these reviews of Gone Girl:
Christianity Today
Hollywood Jesus
Larsen on Film
Reel World Theology
Think Christian
Tinsel
