A well-made mystery surrounding the true story of a 1920s Los Angeles woman whose son has disappeared under the swirl of an extremely corrupt LAPD, director Clint Eastwood proves yet again that he's one of our most important American filmmakers.
With a six-picture run that started with Mystic River in 2003, Eastwood hasn't stumbled in a while; consider the aforementioned 'Mystic River' and then 'Million Dollar Baby', 'Flags of our Fathers', 'Letters from Iwo Jima', 'Changeling' and his current hit 'Gran Torino' (his most popular film yet as both director and actor).
Excluding the more commercial trappings of the last, Eastwood specializes in capturing a certain time and place without adding any unnecessary flourish be it his pair of war films, a boxing picture, or 'Changeling' - a period piece that's told simply, and with conviction. With equivalently understated performances by Angelina Jolie and John Malkovich, 'Changeling' kept me absorbed with sheer storytelling.
With a pair of deserved nominations for art direction and cinematography, Los Angeles circa 1928 is beautifully crafted where we pull in to focus on Christine Collins (Angelina Jolie), a single mother toiling away at her telephone operator gig and trying to make time for her young son Walter (Gattlin Griffith).
Promising a trip to a Chaplin movie, she unexpectedly gets called away to work. With a kiss on the forehead and a promise to take him to the Santa Monica pier the next day, she leaves him to his radio shows (fun period details find the son sitting in the chair two feet from the radio; as I look over at my daughter sitting two feet away from the TV as I write, I realize we haven’t come that far...).
After work, she returns home to find that he's disappeared. Searching all the obvious places, she places a call to the LAPD, who annoyingly informs her that a missing children's case can't be filed for 48 hours. They always turn up by morning the cop said.
And then months pass with no word on her son. The late twenties find the Los Angeles Police Department buried under bad press, incompetence and corruption and some good news is needed badly.
This is when they deliver news to Christine that her son has been found with a drifter in Illinois. Captain J.J. Jones (Jeffrey Donovan, 'Burn Notice') takes it upon himself to invite the press for the mother-son reunion and as Christine anxiously approaches her young son...she confusingly mutters 'that's not my son'.
The boy who they say is Walter is able to recite his address, though, and Captain Jones assures her that the boy in front of her is Walter. Perplexed, she starts to doubt herself and agrees to take this boy home as her son.
It doesn't take long for her to see clearly though, not the least of which is evidence that he's three inches shorter and circumcised - how could she mistake that? Making her findings known to Captain J.J. Jones, he becomes increasingly annoyed with her and insists that the boy is her son.
When she goes public with the help of a radio show preacher and activist Rev. Gustav Briegleb (Malkovich) with news that LAPD returned the wrong son, Jones is able to throw Christine into a mental word with only a signature.
Once she acknowledges that the boy returned to her is Walter, she can leave the ward. As this plays out, a determined detective in Jones department stumbles upon a child who had admitted to helping his older cousin kill 20 children on a desolate chicken farm where he verifies a picture of Walter Collins. But some kids managed to escape. The news of these children gets Christine out of the ward but will she further her complaints of the LAPD? And will the kid killer Gordon Northcott confirm he killed Walter?
With a well-researched script by J. Michael Straczynski (creator of 'Babylon 5' of all things), he fashions a film that’s divided into several distinct acts that take off into different directions throughout the film.
This sometimes gives the film an ungainly feel when considering it as a whole but each act is well thought-out on it's own and at close to two and half hours is given room to breath without feeling meandering or slow.
The film is filled with various characters that are given little to no exposition but spot-on casting makes them flesh and blood. From the actors with one throwaway line all the way to Jolie, I have a feeling everybody doesn't want to let down screen legend Eastwood who is generally given credit for "coaxing" great performances out of actors but I think it's more a matter of simply showing up on set. Who wouldn't want to be at the top of their game for Dirty Harry? Angelina Jolie, who was coming off of summer thoughtbuster 'Wanted', makes Christine Collins a realistic product of her time. Considering this was the late twenties, a single mother probably wouldn't have much say one way or the other and Jolie gives Collins a fierce determination in those early scenes while clearly realizing what her place in society would have been.
By the time her temper rolls around during the climax, it was well justified. It's a deserved nomination for Best Actress which might make up for their oversight with her even better performance in 'A Mighty Heart'.
I will admit that 'Changeling' is one of those films where it's easier to respect and appreciate it than outright enjoy it. It looks flawless, has a subtle score by Eastwood himself and solid performances but if a slow-burn mystery thriller set in 1920s LA sounds a bit dull to you then, yeah, you'll probably find it a bit stuffy.
And some historical details were overlooked if not outright wrong but I think some of these decisions were intentional (Northcott has a particularly shady background that the filmmakers were probably wise not too delve into).
'Changeling' is presented with a 2.35:1 1080p VC1 encode and the results are expectedly strong.
With nominated art direction and cinematography, this is one gorgeous looking film and goes to great lengths to provide a believable Los Angeles from 1928; a town that has probably changed more than any other of its size in the past eighty years. The audio is just as strong with its DTS HD Master Audio track.
Special Features include a 13-minute 'Partners in Crime: Clint Eastwood and Angelina Jolie' featurette where the two fawn over each other. You better watch out Brad! 'The Common Thread: Angelina Jolie Becomes Christine Collins' runs a scant five minutes and mostly focuses on her costumes.
The big feature, a standard with Universal Blu-ray, is 'U-Control', a well-designed feature that presents three different picture-in-picture, graphics-in-picture categories that will play throughout the film upon the press of a button. 'Archives' gives us the real photographs of people and places of the actual case, 'Los Angeles: Then and Now' shows how severely Los Angeles has transformed over the years showings us new photos of LA to compare to the same settings of period LA and 'Picture in Picture' which gives actual behind-the-scenes footage and interviews.
Another shining example of craftsmanship from Clint Eastwood, the film might be a bit stuffy, but with expert performances and tech credits, the pic is an easy recommend. The Blu-ray features outstanding video, audio and some cool special features so this would make a worthy discovery if you missed it in theaters.
Changeling [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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