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Freedomland Movie Review: The story and characters “Freedomland sets up are ambitious by design, but also unwieldy. Taking place in a poor developmental area in New Jersey, it begins with Brenda Martin (Julianna Moore) wandering shellshocked into a hospital. She eventually tells detective Lorenzo Council (Samuel L. Jackson) that she was carjacked, with her 4-year-old son inside the vehicle, by a black man. Before Lorenzo can make a move, Brenda's brother Danny (Ron Eldard), also a detective but of the neighboring town, jumps the gun and organizes a police blockade that cordons off the Armstrong housing projects, trapping its black residents within. The movie then bounds around the several threads here, whipping up hysteria along the way, although not to much effect. The police blockade creates an instantaneous riot potential situation, with the officers in riot gear on one side and an angry mob on the other, upset that such drastic measures are taken to locate and rescue one white child. Lorenzo wants to work quickly to keep things from getting uglier, but Brenda, who isn't telling the whole story, is largely uncooperative, becoming the kind of frustrating character who basically pulls the plot along by slowly revealing information unknown to everyone else. Meanwhile, Edie Falco shows up as Karen, the leader of a group of mothers who take it upon themselves to search for missing children. Everything feels overwrought -- the mob vs. police, Brenda's melodramatically wounded woman, her bug-eyed hot-tempered brother -- all there to create an effect for the sake of effect, with little going on behind it. The movie wishes to communicate anxiety, but because the events lack a deeper dimension and fall back on recycled imagery (from the mob scenes) and character types (not only Brenda and her brother but also the residents of Armstrong and the policemen) the only sensation it creates is bemused numbness. The visual tactics even seem desperate in certain parts -- the early scene when Brenda says "My son was in the car!" leads to a weird part where Lorenzo hyperventilates as he tries to get more information from her, whirling back and forth, whipping out his inhaler, and shoving out people who try to come into the room. Moore seems to be particularly victimized by this drum-up strategy. She's an actress of great skill and I consider myself one of her admirers, but in “Freedomland she gives the worst performance I've seen from her. I hate saying that, but I'm also not sure if the character could've been saved -- Brenda is the person on whom the plot hinges, but she operates with histrionics (speaking of recycled character types, the histrionic woman is one I always hope will be put to rest). Worse yet, she takes the major part in a late scene that brings the movie to a dead halt. It's a scene in which a speech seems to take forever and reveals a whole story going on behind the story we've been seeing, one which we haven't been clued into at all during all the scenes of angry residents, police procedures, and the operations of the search-and-rescue team. That rescue mission, led by Falco's character, is given some kind of conspicuously singled-out relevance as heroic music swells up during their initial foray into an abandoned park. At that point, “Freedomland seems to say this is where its true center lies -- this thread about pain and healing, and the good efforts of good people -- and one of the ending scenes appears to reiterate this. While serving to show how decent its intentions were, it also highlights the awkwardness of the whole vehicle, juxtaposing these rather disparate scenarios – racial tension-driven anger and the mending of personal wounds -- in a surface-glossing manner, more a display than an exploration. As much as his character tries to hold the community together, Jackson, with his levelheaded and reined-in performance, tries his best to hold the whole movie together, giving it at least one reliable emotional anchor. However, by the home stretch the viewers might feel as weary as the put-upon Lorenzo, who subscribes to a philosophy of inevitability, waiting for the events to play out to their conclusion and be done with it. http://www.reeltalkreviews.com By Jeffrey Chen There is this saying that states “less is more”.
Well when it comes to Freedomland, Moore should have been less.
Julianne Moore and Samuel L Jackson star in the thriller, “Freedomland” which opens with Moore stumbling into a hospital with blood soaked hands and utterly hysterical.
The emergency staff tends to the woman as Jackson takes her statement. It turns out she has been in a carjacking and it turned violent. The woman seems to be hiding something and why would she be driving in the wrong part of town so late at night. The more the officer grills her the more she freaks. Until she reveals that her young son was still in the back seat after the carjacking.
The film follows the search for the missing child.
“Freedomland” is a film that should be full of such raw emotion and amazing performances. Jackson and Moore are both at the top of their game. The script was adapted by acclaimed novelist Richard Price who wrote the book. The film was also directed by Joe Roth who directed the critically acclaimed 1986 film, “Streets of Gold”.
So what went wrong?
Well first off, a lot of the blame lies with Roth who doesn’t have a flair for directing dark grisly overly emotional films. His last film was the disastrous “Christmas with the Kranks”. I guess he can’t do comedy either.
The man has directed six films in twenty years and has had a huge success as a producer. He has tried a couple different kinds of films but none have really screamed definitive. Personally I liked his debut film “Streets of Gold” and his 1990 film “Coupe De Ville”.
You can see blatantly where Roth struggled with character development, emotion and plot devices in “Freedomland”. Roth’s direction is sloppy and all over the place as it never knows how to photograph a scene. You can also see Roth was never sure what angle to play with the Moore character and the Jackson character. It is such a ridiculous treatment of two deep, detailed characters it’s a shame that someone with more panache didn’t find this project.
Jackson and Moore are put through the emotional ringer in this flick and they spend 90% of it screaming at the top of their lungs and over-acting till they pass out. Moore is especially a wreck. She is so hard to watch it makes want to scream at the screen, “For the love of God, someone slap that woman!” It’s embarrassing to see such great talent so awful.
On a side note, could someone tell Julianne’s agent to find her a nice happy friendly film or an ensemble dramedy where she isn’t running around like a crazy woman in search of someone who’s done something nasty to her kid.
I liked the story but I felt that it should have been a lot better executed so much better. I really love each of the leads but here I don’t know what to think of them.
Also another part of the film that really confused me was the whole race issue and the racial tensions exploding between cops and a pre-dominantly black neighborhood. I am not sure if this whole angle was needed or if it fit with the film. The case was interesting enough. If it was an intricate part of the novel then it just felt wrong in the context of the film. It’s never fully fleshed out and the case and the racial tensions never really gel.
“Freedomland”
has all the right things going for it and it’s the
perfect film on paper. But it is just plain painful to watch.
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