GONE, BABY, GONE

In "Gone Baby Gone" a four-year-old girl is missing in a tough Boston neighborhood, and private investigators Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro (Casey Affleck and Michelle Monaghan) are asked by family to assist in the case. Kenzie is a street-wise P.I. who utilizes his knowing locals from school to help in the investigation. But this is no easy case, and the there are drug thugs, money, and liars around who complicate their work. Ben Affleck's directorial debut, adapted from the Dennis Lehane novel, also stars Ed Harris, Morgan Freeman and Amy Ryan (in her first Oscar-nominated role for best supporting actress as the missing girl's mother). The police investigation is being led by Jack Doyle (Morgan Freeman) of the Crimes Against Children police task force, who unlike a standard movie cop, doesn't resent these outsiders but suggests they work with his men Remy Bressant (Ed Harris) and Nick Poole (John Ashton). The trail begins in the wreckage of a life being lived by the little girl's single mother, Helene (Amy Ryan). She is deep into drugs, which she takes whenever she can sober up enough, and there seems to be a connection between her supplier and a recent heist of a pile of drug money.