Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck (2007)

I don't care for Boston, I don't care for Ben Affleck, and I double don't care for Ben Affleck's sentimentalism for Boston, which makes it I think something like quadruple surprising that I loved this movie. Intelligently constructed, subtly acted, and, maybe most importantly of all, shot with a kind of this-can't-go-on-it-will-go-on melancholy that suffuses every scene with grace and gravity.

A stray observation: You know what Affleck's Boston reminds me of? The South, as I have gradually come to understand it. Neighborhoods are universes. Secrets are cherished. Appearances are everything. Smart of Affleck to have Ed Harris's character hail from Louisiana, and to cast Mississippi's native son Morgan Freeman as the movie's top cop. Is Ben Affleck smart? Can that be? Must. Recalibrate. Prejudices. . . .