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Gerald Wright's Movie Coverage

CHANGELING

Directed by: Clint Eastwood
Running time: 140 minutes
Release date: October 24, 2008
Genre: Biography, Crime, Drama and Mystery
Distributor: Universal Pictures
MPAA Rating: R

Actor, director, producer, writer, composer and musician Clint Eastwood's newest project is a film based on the actual facts and true story Christine Collins (Angelina Jolie), a telephone operator and single mother in 1928 Los Angeles who returns home from work to find her 9 year old son Walter missing. It's a movie about corrupt cops, an egotistical preacher and a serial killer.

In the theme of L.A. Confidential and Chinatown, this period piece biopic brings to life an incident that Los Angeles would rather keep buried in its news archives. This history of Los Angeles is scorched by stories of corruption, cover-ups and murder during the city's early years of becoming a metropolis. It's public record of the 1920's, from the Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle rape/murder case and the kidnapping of evangelist Aimee McPherson that the political machine was corrupt. In order to get an understanding of the plot, you have to know the setting. Los Angeles in 1928 was in the led by Mayor George E. Cryor (Reed Birney) and enforced by Police Chief James E. "Two Gun" Davis (Colm Feore) who often posed in a wild west gunslinger style for the media. The film does a great job in getting the facts correct and putting the audience in that stage in history with fantastic costumes and props. Eastwood's professionalism and perfection in history on doing this film is uncanny.

Angelina Jolie delivers a great heartbreaking performance as the mother Christine Collins who suffers for five months as the police tell her that they don't have a clue of her son Walter's (Gattlin Griffith) where-abouts. The ironic part of this story is when the police find a boy who isn't Walter and tells Christine it is Walter for media purposes of "looking good" in the public's eyes. This is where Jolie's portrayal of Christine is heightened as she displays unimaginable pain and frustration in a situation that seems hopeless. This is a time in history when women did not have the same power speak their minds as today. Jeffrey Donovan of the t.v series Burn Notice gives a brilliant performance of LAPD Capt. J.J. Jones. He is the principal objective in the railroading of Christine into a mental facility to quiet her. This is a major role for Donovan in the first half of this film along with the advocate Reverand Gustav Briegleb portrayed by the masterful John Malkovich. John Malcovich delivers another outstanding excellent performance as one of Christine's allies.

The latter part of the movie sets its sights on the publicity-craving Canadian killer named B.C. Northcott who is accused in the series of child sex killings. These horrific crimes were dubbed the Wineville Chicken Coop Murders during his sensational 1929 trial. Jason Butler Harner as B.C. Northcott gives a haunting and fascinating performance as the deranged malevolent sociopath who exercised his pedophillic tendencies on this isolated chicken ranch in California. The film takes a turn to focus more on the investigation of missing boys than Jolie's anguish. LAPD Detective Lester Ybarra (Michael Kelly) is the officer who heads the investigation. His role was a simple and banal, reminiscent to Sgt. Friday character on the old t.v. series Dragnet. Amy Ryan, from Eastwood's Mystic River, returned in this movie as a psych ward buddy of Christine's named Carol Dexter. Her limited role proved to be a good part in this movie. It gave clarity to the political lawlessness that ran wild over every facility in Los Angeles.

Biopics should be easy to watch, but I had trouble with the length of time invested in this film. Two hours and twenty minutes could easily be (after more editing) two hours. This not one of Clint Eastrwood's best; however, it isn't bad.


FILM RATING (B)