Then comes Changeling, more manipulative than all of the above, yet with a better story than perhaps any of them. The problem is that movie never builds up enough of an emotional charge for its climactic confrontation to be much of a release. Instead of hitting you like a freight train, Changeling merely slaps you around for a while. When Straczynski likes a character, you can tell because they pop off the screen, like Rev. Briegleb or a tough hooker in the psych ward or, indeed, pre-abduction Christine. But more often than not, what the characters do and say is simply functional, enough to get the job done without angling for something better.
Angelina Jolie impressively plays down her supermodel looks, but the material doesn't give her the chance to stretch like she did in her star-making turn in Girl, Interrupted or her bravura performance in last year's overlooked A Mighty Heart. Her famously large lips coated in bright red lipstick seem cold and garish under the light of cinematographer Tom Stern, who succeeds in making most of the movie seem oddly artificial. A comment on the film's underlying theme of false identity? Nah, that's too clever.
What we end up with is a typical Hollywood melodrama, done with enough workmanlike skill to keep someone's brains turning until the curtain comes up and the credits start to roll. For a lot of movies, that would probably be enough, but for a film with Changeling's talent and pedigree, you'd like to think it would do a little better than average.
Article comments