Don't let the title fool you, this article is not about a typical marriage. This is a review of the movie Gone Girl, meaning that the marriage being talked about here is toxic and downright scary, a marriage of which I hope nobody ever has to suffer through. Now I have to admit, parts of the article, especially with its word choice did confused me a lot (I had to look up several words), but this is part of the rhetoric Brody uses. By using highly technical vocabulary, he is showing who his audience is, film critics and people educated in the nuances of movies, not juniors in high school (though Max might be an exception). He also uses his organization of the article to further his analysis. He starts off in the movie verse, using the characters to explain what he thinks the movie's point is, then goes into the real world, talking about the director and writer.
Brody also uses many, many allusions. They are so heavily used, in fact, that they are part of the problem of why I had so much trouble reading and understanding this. Again, this points towards his audience of people a little better versed in the world of movies than me, though I did get the Social Network reference. Brody also alludes to many movements going on in the real world right now. For example, he uses the “Yes to All Men” movement to show how Nick thinks of himself, while also showing the problems with the movement. I thought Brody was spot on when describing the book and movie as “Unleashing that primordial archetypal fury along with its cosmic irony, making a movie that is a tragedy of our time.” Fancy words, but the meaning behind them is true, and you kind of do have to go all out to even start to explain the raw emotion in the movie, as well as the masked brilliance.
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