I Dream of Dunne
If I had a brownstone and a blonde bob, this would be a threat.
My birthday agenda always includes a movie screening.
This began when I turned fourteen and corralled my fellow summer campers into a viewing of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, a forever favorite that I have now seen over fifty times. Last year, I coaxed my mother and brother into doing the same, a familiar celebration for a film fanatic. To ring in my twenty-first, I selected Gone Girl.
I will not explain the plot of Gone Girl, nor contextualize this essay. You can watch the movie, or hey, even read the book. I will not state my preference, but it will be brutally evident throughout the duration of this piece.
Allow me to maximize the mood with a few of my most fun facts about Gillian Flynn’s cinematic and literary masterpiece. Both the screenplay and the novel were penned by Flynn, something that soothes my book-biased brain. The movie was shot in Cape Girardeau where “Missour-ee” is pronounced “Missou-rah.” According to the script, it is about two hours south of my birthplace, St. Louis. My mother is familiar with this area; she used to make the four hour round trip from our house for work on a regular basis. Another direct connection to the production— on set, a family friend worked as Ben Affleck’s body double, a role comprised almost entirely of standing still and bearing a strong resemblance to the leading man. Amy Dunne, the titular Gone Girl, decimates her competition for my favorite character; as well as my favorite cunt. She is that diva, per Beyonce’s definition. She does what loser freakos like the guy from Trap do, but wearing no underwear. I will always jump to her defense through barks and bites, particularly relishing when even I’m in complete disagreement with the argument I’ve cobbled together. A bitch stands by a bitch. Is she crazy? Undeniably so.
I’ve consumed video essay after video essay, (the intellectual’s YouTube vice,) diagnosing her with half of the DSM-5, a whole string of personality disorders. That being said, I can only imagine what would snap inside of me if I watched my loser husband recreate our first kiss outside of the bar I graciously funded with a twenty-year-old. I have felt crazier over less. I think the takeaway would be that she kept herself together enough not to let a little internalized misogyny take over and blame the mistress, but rather focused the full force of her rage on said loser husband. Call her a misandrist; I fear she may be pioneering feminism.
Despite this, throughout my rage-induced resurgent love for this movie, I’ve stumbled upon something that recontextualized my love for Ms. Dunne. An article that is making me feel almost proud of my constant defense of her indefensible actions. Drew Gregory, a multi-hyphenate in queer media, wrote this incredible essay, “I Didn’t Understand Gone Girl Until I Was a Woman,” in 2019 about womanhood, Gone Girl, being trans, and how the three interact.
“It’s true that Amy is psychotic, but her actions feel rational and satisfying, not to mention downright impressive, set against the backdrop of patriarchy. Can someone really be psychotic in a psychotic world? Maybe two wrongs do in fact make a right,”
Gregory wrote, explaining exactly why it is so easy to back her crimes against such a prototypical douche-man.
Though I have often tried, I've never been able to assemble a successful argument in defense of Amy, which is saying something, as I showed up and showed out on the LSAT. You have to concede that her actions aren’t based in sanity for your argument to even be considered. It’s hard to justify the death penalty as punishment for cheating when being logical. But why are we even bothering to limit ourselves to a logical mindset when the movie is set in a society that constantly checks logic at the door?
There are many people I loathe with the visceral amount of animosity necessary to follow through with a plot as particularly cruel as Amy Dunne’s. Examples are limited to people such as: that freeloading skank that tried to mooch off of my duct tape wallet success in fourth grade, (there is a reason your business was not flourishing as lushly as mine, Carly), my college suitemates sophomore year that thought there was a period blood fairy (otherwise who did they think was cleaning that up?), and my ex-boyfriend that grew weirdly attached to my yeast infection (think sympathy pregnancy, but for fungal overgrowth). Other highlighted Ben Affleck level evils include portions and entireties of the Emerson College administration, with an emphasis on the Board of Trustees and the Man-In-Charge. This being said, I am very conscious about aspects of my digital footprint, and do not want to publish anything possibly construable as threatening. This hypothetical scenario targets no specific individual.
To be completely honest, it is a testament to my mental health and proof that I am a strong and sane woman that I have yet to hatch a quasi Gone Girl plot on a single one of my exes. Still, I would much rather follow through with an Amy Dunne-esque scheme than reenact my other favorite breakup film and movie of All Time, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. No relief is worth the risk of ending up back in a relationship with one of those bums!
Unlike Ms. Dunne, I refuse to plot and plan within the pages of a paper journal. This seems too easily foilable. As a freshman in high school, I diligently kept a paper journal, scribbling in an entry each night before my mother skimmed through its contents and banned me from continuing to date a legal adult. In hindsight I am very grateful, but the incident left me with a distrust of a diary unwatched and unguarded. Instead, I would concoct my schemes on a Google Doc, under the email I created for the friendship bracelet making business I spearheaded in the fourth grade. This is completely separate from my aforementioned duct tape wallet venture. If you haven’t heard of the company, it is because we failed to expand outside of our neighborhood. The only password holders are myself and my brother, who would never foil my plot due to his midwestern mama’s boy sense of loyalty.
Next, I will fabricate a tale leading up to the point of my disappearance, so delectable that it can be used in lieu of any evidence in any court. Now the girl is gone!
I refuse to contribute anything that can be construed as an argument against Believing Women, so my story will include exactly zero allegations of abuse or assault, sexual or otherwise (this would also be zero fun to write about, and my mind is ruled by potential joy).
Initially, entries will seem completely innocuous— just a typical diary detailing a pretty mundane life. As you read deeper, however, my vision is for readers to wonder if they’re essentially just reading a slightly revised version of The Fault in Our Stars (the only audiobook I own because I accidentally pressed buy on my Kindle Fire in elementary school).There’s no detail to confirm that suspicion, so they just keep assuming it bears a confusing resemblance to NYT bestseller John Green’s hit Young Adult novel. By the time the cops reach the entry where My Target whisks me up to the attic of the Anne Frank house for our first kiss, juries will be itching to convict. I do not know what charges any alleged crimes would fall under, which I think is good, because I am still anxious that this could be a prosecutable threat, and ambiguity feels like a safety blanket.
My self insert has been written—it is time to disappear. I leave just enough peculiarity to merit investigative suspicion by those who know me well: items that litter the space, (such as a loose anti-anxiety pill, a clipping of my now-retired fake ID to encourage a down-to-earth kind of vibe, or a note my mom left in my lunchbox a decade ago,) still stand in their usual spots, yet my Anora poster that I waited in line outside in the cold for three hours to obtain has fallen and is creasing on the microwave. It is a cold February day and yet the only scarf I own, one I crocheted myself and never miss a chance to flaunt about in, is crumpled up on a chair (the acrylic yarn will lose the shape I steamed it into).
I am a wee-bit too self important to off myself, so that is never included in this plan. Luckily, it doesn’t have to be. Every other aspect has just been that good, a body would not be necessary to prosecute my alleged murder. My story would also never include an excursion to Neil Patrick Harris’ surveilled McMansion at the Lake of the Ozarks, as my grandparents have a condo there only three minutes (!!!) walking distance from a basketball court, and that’s all a once-girl-now-gone could ever dream of. I will spend my days haunting the community pool and spilling my woes about my cheating loser slimeball freak nerd husband to my best friend of two days in a bad accent. I would choose an Elvis impression. As a girl who too was once dragged to the navel of this great country, I feel like I have something to draw from.
So here is that:
Feel free to watch the scene on YouTube and marvel at my ability to capture the character.
When my femme fatale fantasy inevitably falls short and I am forced to crawl, nay, slither the streets until I’m home, I will do so donned in the Amy Dunne costume I fashioned for the second Halloweekend of my college years whilst Fiona Apple’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters echoes off the concrete. I will be blogging about the entire experience, which I’m assuming will result in charges, but will also be the inspiration for a quippy piece about how I would follow through with the plot of Chicago.
“Cool Girl. Men always use that, don’t they? As their defining compliment. She’s a Cool Girl. Cool Girl is hot. Cool Girl is game. Cool Girl is fun. Cool Girl never gets angry at her man. She only smiles in a chagrin loving manner and then presents her mouth for fucking. She likes what he likes. So, evidently, he's a vinyl hipster who loves fetish manga. If he likes girls gone wild, she’s a mall babe who talks football and endures buffalo wings at Hooters. When I met Nick Dunne, I knew he wanted a cool girl and for him, I’ll admit, I was willing to try. I wax stripped my pussy raw. I drank canned beer watching Adam Sandler movies. I ate cold pizza and remained a size 2. I blew him… semi regularly. I lived in the moment. I was fucking game. I can’t say I didn’t enjoy some of it… Nick teased out in me things I didn’t know existed. A lightness, a humor, an ease. But I made him smarter, sharper, I inspired him to rise to my level. I forged the man of my dreams. We were happy pretending to be other people. We were the happiest couple we knew. And what's the point of being together if you're not the happiest? But Nick got lazy. He became someone I did not agree to marry. He actually expected me to love him unconditionally. Then he dragged me, penniless, to the navel of this great country and found himself a newer, younger, bouncier cool girl. You think I'd let him destroy me and end up happier than ever? No fucking way. He doesn't get to win. My cute, charming, salt-of-the-earth Missouri guy. He needed to learn. Grown-ups work for things. Grown-ups pay. Grown-ups suffer consequences.” - Gillian Flynn