Gone (2006)

Sorry, this movie sucks

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

When the British Alex (Shaun Evans) arrives alone in Sydney, he meets the handsome American Taylor (Scott Mechlowicz) that invites him to drink in a bar. On the next morning, Alex awakes completely wasted sleeping with a girl on the floor and Taylor takes a Polaroid picture of them. Alex is going to Byron to meet his girlfriend Sophie (Amelia Warner) and Taylor offers a lift to him. Sophie introduces her friend Ingrid (Zoe Tuckwell-Smith) to Taylor and the two couples plan to travel together; however Ingrid does not meet them and Taylor tells that she had decided to travel with a girlfriend instead. Along the journey, Alex finds that Taylor is a manipulative psychopath that is obsessed with Sophie; however, his girlfriend believes that Alex is jealous without any reason and does not give credit to his words. When they have a car accident in a lonely area, Alex is wounded on the head and Taylor manipulates Sophie and Alex intriguing one against the other. When Sophie receives a text from Alex telling that he is gone, she accepts the ride that Taylor offers to her but she finds the truth about her new friend. "Gone" is a suspenseful road movie in the outback surprisingly good. The plot is developed in slow-pace, with the gorgeous Amelia Warner becoming the obsession of the deranged and manipulative Taylor. Alex has a skeleton in the closet because of the picture that Taylor is blackmailing him and acts weird with his girlfriend. The story is predictable but also entertaining. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "A Face Oculta do Mal" ("The Hidden Face of Evil")

Utterly derivative psycho on the road movie. We've seen it all before and to make things worse pretty much nothing happens throughout. I looked at the clock after twenty minutes and was still waiting for some semblance of story to begin. I was still waiting after an hour. There's a difference between understated and not stated at all. Who is the creepy Taylor? What happened in Thailand?Questions are left unanswered and the ending predictable. "Are you f****ing thick?" the main character asks his girlfriend when she fails to spot Taylor's intentions. Apparently so. She's obviously never seen Dead Calm, Single White Female, Pacific Heights and a million other movies with the same premise. To be fair the acting is acceptable but otherwise what on earth is Working Title doing wasting their time with this?

In this film a UK couple travelling across Australia, pal up with an easy-going American who turns out to have a 'dark-side'.This film scores in the respect that the way the American gradually reveals his hidden character is quite subtle. He manipulates the couple into turning against each other and then uses the chasm he creates to perform a divide-and-conquer type operation.The film falls short in as much the female, as the easily duped girlfriend, isn't quite believable, and seems so gullible that if you told her with a cute smile that her panties were on fire she'd probably go and jump in a lake. Although I think this can be accounted for by the script.Also the ending is quite silly.

Gone, despite the lame title, is an enjoyable film from first time director Ringan Ledwidge.A very underplayed thriller revolving around the relationship between a backpacking British couple and a suspicious American, I found the film refreshing for managing to avoid the same traps that most films of this genre stumble with.The catalyst of the film - the relationship between the two male leads - was handled delicately, full of nuance, and was almost Hitchcockian in its building of suspense.As the events of the film are comparable to the recent Peter Falconio / Joanne Lees case, it would have been advisable to set the film elsewhere - especially since the vast expanse of the Australian outback has been seen too recently in films like John Hillcoat's 'The Proposition' and Phillip Noyce's 'Rabbit Proof Fence'. A possible alternative for the location of the film could have been New Zealand's South Island - picturesque, isolated, and just as popular with backpackers as Australia.I was lucky enough to see a preview screening of the film, followed by a Q&A session with Ringan Ledwidge and Amelia Warner. Definitely one to watch, Warner could be a future English rose of the film industry (especially if she manages to avoid wearing orange lamé blouses in public!). Watch this space!Elsewhere on this site, there is mention of the film being a rip-off of Dead Calm. Although I can see the similarities, Gone is a much more intriguing film. Although the two films deal with the same issues, I see Dead Calm as a popcorn film for the masses. Gone, on the other hand, is much more cerebral and perfect for an audience who appreciates attention to detail.I would definitely recommend this film to friends.