Take the True Movies survey and win a selection of DVDs!Here at True Movies, we are constantly working towards making our channel the best it can be. As we highly value the opinions of our viewers, we would like you to take a brief moment to complete a short survey, and help us to make True Movies the best thing on TV!
We will also be picking one lucky contributor to win a selection of True Movies on DVD, so if you’re feeling lucky, and fancy making a difference to the True Movies channel,
take the True Movies survey!
Freedomland (15)
Released by Sony Pictures Entertainment
Stars: Samuel L Jackson, Julianne Moore, Edie Falco
Writer: Richard Price
Director: Joe Roth
As the racial tension grows on a Brooklyn Housing Project, a bleeding white woman, Benda (Julianne Moore) wanders through the turmoil and arrives at the hospital where she announces that her four-year old son has been kidnapped by a black car-jacker.
Enter the empathetic local cop, Lorenzo Council, who has to balance the needs of his neighbours with the heart-rending plight of Brenda who seems to be falling apart with grief and guilt.
Obviously, Brenda’s story does little to calm the tension and Council is caught squarely in the middle of a tinderbox of emotion and violence.
But as he investigates further, all is not as it first seems.
So, what do we have here? Three top of the line actors, a provocative and solid human story all working in a script by one of the best crime writers in the business . This is man who wrote ‘Sea of Love’, ‘The Colour of Money’ and most recently a good deal of TV’s ‘The Wire’ as well as a host of best-selling novels, of which ‘Freedomland’ was one. So on paper, this should be a winner.
That is ultimately fails is squarely down to director Joe Roth (who replaced Brit Michael Winterbottom on the film) and who is perhaps best known as a producer and top movie executive rather than a director, although he did direct the enjoyable rom-com ‘Hollywood Sweethearts’. The main problem is that he doesn’t manage to control Moore’s performance, which veers wildly between the poignant and the irritating and she manages to overbalance the film. Falco (‘The Sopranos’) really scores as a mother who finds her own way of coming to terms with a the loss of a child, but it’s Jackson who’s the centre of the picture. Never less than watchable, it’s his charisma and natural warmth that carries the film and makes it worth spending time with.
On Blu Ray, the disc boasts a pristine transfer with great depth and detail. Black levels, colour and contrast are spot on. The lossless TrueHD 5.1 sound mix is never less than adequate, but rarely has much to do as this is essentially a dialogue-driven movie. Extras include a fascinating interview with Richard Price and an interesting BD Live feature, for those with players who can handle it!
Mark Deitch