CAREFULLY deconstructing the facades of the modern day middle class, David Fincher in his film ​Gone Girl (based on the novel by Gillian Flynn), depicts the devolution of a class with no great external struggle. A class that looks inward for its conflict and entertainment needs. Throughout ​Gone Girl, while Nick and Amy Dunne seem positioned to convey the movies major critiques, the insufferable background noise of the uninformed masses actually makes the bigger statement. With nothing better to do, they latch onto any juicy story, regardless of validity or importance. Their self righteousness leads to feelings of accomplishment, and they walk away smug as their preconceived notions gradually prove false. This points to a fundamental deficiency of purpose for the modern day middle class, and its own self destructive behavior.

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In some capacity, everyone lies. We hide facts, our character, our opinions and a wide range of other information. Nick wonders,

“What are you thinking? What are you feeling? What have we done to each other?”

while lying in bed next to his wife Amy. Even in marriage, a union where you supposedly bare all to one another, thoughts and feelings are kept private. Whole identities are constructed just for work or socializing. Amy conjures an entirely false persona to befriend a neighbor. She invites her over for wine, commiserates with her, and earns her trust. What’s more, the entire suburban populace suddenly dons a mask as well. They pretend to care about Amy and they pretend to want to find her. In reality, all they crave is a sense of accomplishment. They attack Nick and nearly line him up for execution, but do they really hate him? Once Amy returns, they cheer him on as a tragic hero. None of the middle class characters unabashedly display their true intentions; each one hides behind a different mask, a different lie. With no struggle to define themselves, they construct their own identities and become who they always dreamed they would be, further distancing themselves from reality.

While the suburbanites spin their stories, we meet Lola and Boyd at the motel. Amy believes she can find refuge at the dingy motel park, but unbeknownst to her, her facade crumbles here. As Lola and Boyd rob Amy of her savings, Lola sneers,

“I don’t think you’ve really been hit before.”

The two saw straight through Amy’s disguise. Amy views them and the lower class as trash. However, over the past few years she has been playing to an audience that yearns to be deceived and entertained. Now she faces two people from a place where they have to steal to survive. They do not have the same types of means as Amy. They live in a glorified trailer park. In large part their struggles have defined and shaped them. Lola and Boyd do have a purpose; to survive from day to day, week to week. Amy’s tricks fail because Lola and Boyd are critical of her and choose not to believe the lie, the story she has so carefully constructed. Lola describes real domestic abuse, real horrors that the quaint suburban neighborhood couldn’t fathom. It becomes clear that the lower class can see straight through Amy’s, and subsequently the rest of suburbia’s, mask.

If the lower class can see through Amy’s story, the upper class simply does not care. Amy’s rich ex-boyfriend, Desi Collings, sweeps her off her feet the second she finds herself most vulnerable. As she recites her lies, she notices that they garner neither the sympathy nor the derision that she has become accustomed to. Desi simply brushes it aside. He owns Amy now. Another toy in his mansion to bring him pleasure. Growing frustrated by her frequent denials of his advances, he decides to ignore her claim of domestic abuse. We never truly know if he believes it or not, but what is clear is even if he did believe her, it was not stopping him. Desi’s life has purpose in his pursuits. His wealth allows him to chase the finer things for his satisfaction, unlike the middle class who remain trapped in their own self constructed bubble.

Driving all this home, halfway through the film lies the grand reveal. As Amy tosses those cute fuzzy pens out her window, the audience gets yanked back to reality. Fincher defies one of murder mystery’s biggest tropes: the husband did it. The reporter asks,

“Nick Dunne. You’re probably the most hated man in America right now. Did you kill your wife, Nick?”

with a foregone conclusion in mind. Of course he killed his wife, now he just needs to confess. For the first half of the movie, the audience’s hand was held down the path of contempt; just as the angry mob’s was. Clue after clue our anger grew towards Nick. With each diary entry the certainty that Nick was the killer strengthened. By the reveal, one could hear a “Lock ​him up!” chant growing in the theater. But just as the audience becomes certain Nick killed his wife, Fincher pulls out the rug and all notions of justice come crashing down. We are forced to look around and examine ourselves. We have become the angry locals present in the film. We see the locals have gone from a sympathetic bunch to raving lunatics. And slowly but surely the realization hits, we are not in any way superior to the mob. Just minutes earlier we were one and the same. In fact, without being privy to the reveal, we would have continued down the exact same path of those we now look down upon with patronizing contempt.

Throughout ​Gone Girl, the oh so helpful suburban neighbors slowly take on a darker light. They go from a group just trying their hardest to help and seek justice for a friendly face, to a bloodthirsty mob looking for the freshest drama to bite into for the week. After all, what else are they to do? They seek meaning in their excruciatingly average lives. There is no survival involved with living in a lovely cookie cutter, white washed neighborhood. There are no grand escapades to go on in search of expensive trinkets or treasures. Middle class Americans are trapped in a bubble of their own creation. They don the masks of lives they wished they had to perform for their peers, each putting on a play of their own. Seeking any form of satisfaction they create their own threats, their own killers. As a unit they are going to fight back against their own conjured demons. Maybe then they will feel the rush and sense of accomplishment that has been so desperately missing from their lives. Maybe then they will have a purpose to be proud of, instead of wasting away their days gulping down wine and gossiping about the new neighbors. However, the lack of sincerity and purpose in the act ultimately proves it insufficient. The morsel of satisfaction gained simply keeps them hungry and coming back for more. Without true purpose, the disenfranchised American middle class will be left to wallow in the conflict of its own creation, fueled by the desire for any form of entertainment; a modern day bread and circus.