The huge hype around the film adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s best selling 2012 novel Gone Girl got hotter this week with the release of the film’s first publicity shot.

Entertainment Weekly magazine released its annual ‘year in review’ issue this week, with Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike posing as their Gone Girl characters on the cover.

Affleck and Pike play the protagonist married couple, Nick and Amy Dunne, in the crime thriller set in New York City and Missouri.

The story kicks off with the disappearance of Amy and both sides of the couple’s story is then told through Amy’s diary in the lead up to her vanishing and Nick’s interpretation of their marriage after she goes missing and when he is under suspicion for her murder. This psychological heart starter has an incredible twist mid way through.

Giving the film further kudos is director David Fincher, who has also directed Seven, Fight Club, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Social Network and the US adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Other key roles in the film have been filled by Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry and beautiful up and comer Emily Ratajkowski, who starred in the controversial video for Robin Thicke’s 2013 hit Blurred Lines.