Ben Affleck A Murder Suspect In ‘Gone Girl’ Trailer [Video]

Actor Ben Affleck is a murder suspect in David Fincher’s adaptation of Gone Girl. As promised, the highly anticipated trailer hit the internet last night after bits were shown on Access Hollywood.

Now we can see Ben Affleck as Nick Dunne, the man who is wrongly accused of killing his wife Amy Dunne, when she mysteriously goes missing. It’s no surprise that the trailer prominently features Affleck as the complex character of a grieving husband who’s also desperate to find his wife and exonerate himself in the media.

Although Rosamund Pike is featured in the trailer as his wife through flashbacks, we suspect that most of her work will be saved for the viewing audience, as her role is said to be a sure Oscar contender.

Like most of David Fincher’s trailers, Gone Girl is a moody piece. The trailer is a dark, creeping visual juxtaposed by an off-putting song by Charles Aznavour called “She,” which is a take off of the original song by Elvis Costello. While it’s an effective use, it doesn’t touch the tone Fincher created for The Social Network with the choir singing Radiohead’s “Creep.”

For those who were holding on to the dream that one day Ben Affleck would play real-life murderer Scott Peterson, who he once had a striking resemblance to, they will have to settle for Gone Girl. Keeping that in mind, it doesn’t seem like such a consolation prize, as his performance as Nick Dunne, if going by the trailer, seems to be powerful and simmering with an undertone for danger. Although Affleck isn’t usually praised for his acting choices, if there’s ever a director to pull the best work out of him, it has to be David Fincher, a man who has always had impeccable casting tastes.

Gone Girl comes off the heels of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, which wasn’t a favorite by any stretch if going by the mixed reviews it received. In 2011 Fincher admitted, “we may have been too beholden to the source material.”

Looking to learn from that lesson, it’s been reported that Fincher set out to change Gillian Flynn’s third act. Both Flynn and Fincher worked together to change the final act. Flynn spoke to Entertainment Weekly to comment on the change, “Ben [Affleck] was so shocked by it. He would say, ‘This is a whole new third act! She literally threw that third act out and started from scratch.'”

Check out the trailer for Gone Girl below: