Boy, it sure would've been useful to have DNA testing in 1928.
Overall, I found it mildly entertaining. The problem is that some scenes are ludicrously cheesy, none of the actors are really very likable, and the movie sets up the demarcation between the good and the bad guys too clearly. It's very heavy-handed. But Changeling is really a veritable grab bag of cinematic themes. It has the period piece-y-ness of Road to Perdition; the police station confessions of an episode of Law and Order; a corrupt police department straight out of The Wire; an identity-crisis-mindfuck a la The Net; an eery hanging scene like Capote; and a few shots of disturbing ruralville murders straight out of... The Hills Have Eyes?
Summary: Angelina Jolie's child goes missing. After five months, the overtly corrupt LAPD claims they found him in Illinois. Mother and son reunite, only it's the wrong kid. Jolie protests, but the LAPD convince her she's nuts. Then she protests some more, and they throw her in a nuthouse. Meanwhile, a random kid is picked up by the cops who confesses to helping a man murder 20 kids in the California countryside, one of whom turns out to be Jolie's kid. Maybe. All of this time, Jolie has involuntarily enlisted the help of local radio activist John Malkovich, who breaks her out of the asylum and gets all the top cops fired.
Criticisms:
-Length. 140 minutes should be reserved for epic comic book/action flicks, or There Will Be Blood-style masterpieces. Changeling is neither. Come on, Clint.
-Jolie's son goes missing, she finally gets in touch with the cops, and then BOOM -- the movie jumps ahead several months. Very jarring technique. It's almost as if the missing son is just incidental to the plot, which he kind've is, but still.
-That hat. Is so terrible. That there are no words. She wears this for probably 3/4ths of the movie. Was America in the 1920s a pseudo-Islamic nation?
-Jolie's acting, overall, is good. Considering that Jolie's recent career consists of Wanted, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, and a few stints playing Lara Croft, I'd say this is a nice change of pace. Still, when she tries to get super-melodramatic, she mostly fails. So her Oscar nomination was pretty token.
-Whoever did Malkovich's hair is retarded. Is he supposed to be a German-American radio host or the Cowardly Lion?
-Maybe I'm overthinking things, but there was a fairly clear discontinuity in how Jolie's kid got abducted. We are informed that the crazy loon dude and his accomplice kid friend pick up vulnerable kids by driving around and saying "Hey, we've been looking all over for you. Your folks got into an accident and they want us to come get you. Come on!" And then the unsuspecting kid jumps into the car and proceeds to get murdered with an axe. Except Angelina Jolie was a single mom, and therefore, the "folks" aspect of this story wouldn't fly with her son. Again, maybe I'm overthinking things...
-The aspect of this movie where the LAPD convinces Jolie that this fake kid is indeed her kid is very annoying. I realize it's 1928 and women have no rights, but come on. And yet even worse is when she takes the kid home, in a state of faux bewilderment. Then she eats dinner with him, and you know that she knows this isn't her kid, but she's... confused, or something. And then she gives him a bath, and then, and only then, when she realizes this child is circumcised (her kid wasn't), does she flip out and come to grips with the fact that this isn't her son. It's like WTF: you knew this was the wrong kid!
-Why does Amy Ryan always get the thankless, coke whore, unfit mother, frazzled lunatic roles? I realize she's not Keira Knightley, but that has to be tiring.
