When I first learned that Ben Affleck had directed a movie, I was skeptical. Despite his work with Good Will Hunting and other films like Changing Lanes and Dogma, I always think of Affleck as the guy in Armageddon, Pearl Harbor and Daredevil. But with his directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, Affleck has returned to his role as storyteller and left behind his blockbuster celebrity. More than that though, he’s told a story that speaks to the lives of people who are working to get by in the day to day, and perhaps not doing so well.

The story revolves around Patrick Kenzie, played by Affleck’s brother Casey, a private eye with young looks and connections to the people on the street. When a young girl in town goes missing, her aunt hires Patrick and his partner Angie to use their ability to work on the street to help find her. From here the film travels downward into worlds of drug dealers, missing children and the personal responsibility of the actions we all take:

One of the graces of “Gone Baby Gone” is its sensitivity to real struggle, to the lived-in spaces and worn-out consciences that can come when despair turns into nihilism. Mr. Affleck doesn’t live in these derelict realms, but, for the most part, he earns the right to visit. [The New York Times]

What really works for Affleck beyond his story are his characters and the actors he’s got playing them. Amy Ryan, who I adored as Beadie on The Wire, has a marvelous turn as Helene McCready, the mother of the missing girl. She defines an unfit mother, the people we often hear of in blips on television but forget almost instantaneously. Where Ryan triumphs is that she makes it hard for us to forget. Fans of The Wire will also be pleased to know that Michael Kenneth Williams, aka Omar, is also in the film. His role is small, but the strangeness and thrill of seeing him in a cop uniform is perhaps reason enough to watch the film.

More than anything though, Gone Baby Gone is a story that takes into the lives of people that we’d rather ignore and into the world of abducted children, which we would all rather ignore as well. / to learn how you can help in the world of missing children and be sure to watch the trailer below.