It is a crowded field: Tyler Perry qualifies, a candidate is noted as being in only about four scenes, Casey Wilson, and one host's personal choice Lola Kirk (as transcribed), Jemima Kirk's sister from Girls also seen in Mozart in the Jungle; Scoot McNary (as transcribed) as Tommy O'Hara, who tells Nick the whole story of their encounter in one harrowing, intense scene with the 'you do know your wife' line, is a literal heat check, something he keeps doing in ninety-second roles.
Another host's obvious pick is Emily: her entire performance, with sincere admiration, is standing in the snow so Ben Affleck can rub her lips, sitting on a couch so he can take her dress off, mouthing 'fuck you' at the vigil, then dressing in a schoolgirl-innocent outfit for her press conference, so there is weirdly range in it; she is also fodder for the incredible underwear exchange between Nick and Go.
Final positions: Emily is one pick, another goes Lola, and a third likes Tyler Perry's likable, funny performance ending with 'she got you, what are you going to do', which Wesley's piece sums up as one long 'y'all white people are crazy'.
Earlier, during the scenes, Lola Kirk (as transcribed) was declared the runaway Dionne Waiters (as transcribed) winner unless someone wanted to have the Tyler Perry argument, for the pool scene and her memory of Affleck touching Emily's face.
The first hour is watchable but rewatchability heats up around the big turn; the first nominee is Affleck coming home to find Amy missing and calling the police, with the neighbor across the street, the lady cop quietly suspicious because it is usually the husband, and the meticulousness of the search, which sets the film up as a whodunit it is not.
You have to instantly believe Rhonda Boney knows what she is doing, because she is a central figure and the last life raft for hoping someone keeps pursuing the case; her post-it notes on the blood spatter and the way she reads the plugged-in iron beside a dress that represents romance show something is up right away.
The outdoor Amy rally with protesters is a good scene with a good twist, shot wide so it feels like another bullshit vigil before the turn against Ben Affleck; Casey Wilson is great as Noelle, the extremely dumb pregnant neighbor seduced into Amy's plan, and the shots of Emily Ratajkowski mouthing words back at him and of Affleck fleeing cameras in slow motion like a lumbering old quarterback are smartly staged.
The big reveal, 'I am so much happier now that I'm dead', arrives one hour and seven minutes in, a point where Bloodsport is nearly over; Amy's monologue runs about five pages on IMDb though it is much shorter than the book's cool girl passage, and a first-time viewer briefly fears a dead-narrator movie before 'technically missing, soon to be presumed dead' lands.
Asked to read the bold paragraph aloud, she asks which part, protests that her dad listens to these podcasts, hates the 'befriend a local idiot, fake a murder' part because she feels bad for the local, and identifies the waxing passage as the part she is being made to read before reading it. — Mallory Rubin
The paragraph read aloud, waxing, canned beer and Adam Sandler movies, cold pizza at a size two, forging the man of her dreams and being the happiest couple they knew, is called the whole movie in one paragraph: a couple that learned to like the identity of being a couple more than being together; someone asks whether there were no salons in New York.
Taking issue with that reading, he recalls his father, not a speech-giver, sitting him down before his wedding to say that people change: Nick changes and becomes a less good partner, Amy becomes more insane with a history of manipulation involving Skeet Ulrich's character, and after the sparks of first meeting everyone has pitched a slightly more appealing version of themselves. — Sean Fennessey
The other key passage is 'you think I'd let him destroy me and end up happier than ever? No fucking way. He doesn't get to win. Grownups work for things, grownups pay, grownups suffer consequences.'
Teased that he has the happiest marriage anyone on the show knows and yet loves a film that is its opposite, he answers that it ends with her covered in blood coming back, and it is fun to watch and be glad that is not him right now. — Shea Serrano
Lola Kirk (as transcribed) is shouted out as the runaway Dionne Waiters (as transcribed) winner, especially the pool scene and her re-enactment of Affleck touching Emily's face; Nick's interview with the TV host played by the actress from The Fugitive (transcribed 'Cee LaWord') works like the unseen heist in Reservoir Dogs, cutting to the car where he is told how good he was.
Amy's return to Nick's house is called amazing: one host watching with Laramie, who had read the book, could not believe her stumbling out of the car covered in blood, with Affleck's 'you bitch' in her ear, the 'I'm not a quitter' lead-up to the interview and the twin sister crying devastated in the kitchen, an amazing Carrie Coon performance; that host's pick is Amy returning and everything after, while another much prefers the beginning.
Smaller early picks: the first police interview, where 'she's a voracious reader' reveals how little Nick knows about his wife, Boney's instant lack of trust, Gil asking whether they are really married and the blood-type question, which leaves the hosts admitting they do not know their own or their wives' blood types, or even their social security numbers.
The press conference: Nick's four words devoid of sincere emotion, the iconic pie-eating grin beside the poster, contrasted with her parents going into stump-speech mode with talking points; the parents sold her childhood and turned her into something others could digest, which earns some sympathy for Amy and explains both relationships.
The Desi murder has to be in the list as the most iconic, amazingly staged scene, with Amy untucking his shirt so the security cameras catch him tucking it back in, but some find it too unpleasant to rewatch; even on a seventh or eighth viewing, the throat slicing still shocks.
The reveal is the pick for several: one expected the familiar turn where the husband's face goes evil and the body is in the basement, and instead sat hands on head listening to her explain everything; 'America loves pregnant women' followed by calling Noelle a pregnant idiot, and the closing pregnancy reveal, tie it all neatly together.
The seduction scenes are also good: the meet-cute at the party, the proposal at the Amazing Amy book party, Nick posing as a journalist, really a men's-magazine writer; the reveal, another host's pick, references those fairy-tale early days as true and crucial, the foundation for believing in their love at all.
What makes the reveal great beyond the shock is the pride and vindication in Amy's meticulous steps, 300 diary entries written with different pens, sitting on the kitchen floor of a home in his hometown she never wanted, an IV draining her own blood while she reads a book, with a quick shot that Nick would clean poorly; one host would pay for just the first part as a rom-com, which is said to already exist as He's Just Not That Into You.
