Gone Baby Gone (10 out of 10)

First and foremost, for those who have not watched this movie I would definitely recommend it especially if you are one of many people who enjoy to have talks about morality because there are two characters who discuss this in the film in such a way that is not out of place however I will touch on that later. So without further adieu here is my first movie review.

Acting- 10 out of 10:
In this film each actor and actress does such a convincing job at portraying their character that you forget that you are watching high caliber actors such as Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris and Casey Affleck. I myself am not a huge Ben Affleck fan however his younger brother Casey actually knows how to act, and act well. Aside from Ocean's Eleven the only other movie where I have seen Casey in was The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford where he had the role of the awkward and subtly creepy Robert Ford.

The dialog between characters in this movie is wide ranging from morality to drugs, alcohol to street talk and back again. None of the dialog seems forced and everything appears to fit the occasion and not have the particular occasion brought to the film just to have a piece of dialog filled.

Visual Intrigue- 8 out of 10
This category receives a couple notches out of its score because of the lack of visual effects. For the most par there is some cinematography and other visual elements such as that which is honed in different scenes to take us on the same journey as the characters however any sort of improvement on bulletime effects would have felt out of place in this crime drama, which is why the rating is still very good.

Story- 10 out of 10
All I will say about this is that you will think you have it figured out but then you will be proved wrong. The end almost made me pinch myself.

Soundtrack- 9 out of 10
In this film Ben Affleck uses a "less is more" mentality regarding music. For about 90% of the movie there is absolutely no music which adds a nice cinematic effect to the film. When music is introduced it is for key scenes in the movie.

Overall- 10 out of 10
Even though there was a lack of visual intrigue the acting made up for it ten times over. The scene with Casey Affleck speaking with "Cheese" has a nice piece of dialog for Casey in which he shines magnificently.

Themes:
The main theme I caught from this movie was the whole idea of the proceeding of right action after the truth is realized. One can know the truth and do nothing or know very little and choose to remain in that state of mind. Then there are people who will search for the truth no matter what dirt they have to get on their hands or where they must go to find the truth, and once it is found, they do something about it. Truth is meaningless without action. Faith is worthless without deeds.

Other Thoughts:
This film is a fantastic debut for Ben Affleck and will hopefully be one of many from this young director. Let's just hope that he doesn't pull a Mel Gibson or a Clint Eastwood and decide to act in one of them.