Das Gesicht der Wahrheit

Julianne Moore is looking for a child again, but this time it's real time, hardscrabble New Jersey projects rather than the mind of a perplexing mom (Forgotten, 2004). Moore plays Brenda Martin, who claims to have lost her son to a carjacker who absconded with her son sleeping in the back seat? Veteran detective Lorenzo Council is indeed the counseling type whose patience with the ranting Martin wears thin as he suspects lies among her details of the abduction.

Director Joe Roth seems to be more interested in the racial combustion inherent in the situation. In fact, he goes to lengths to show white police confronting black protesters, who are rightfully furious at the support for the disappearance of one white child when many more black missing children barely cause a ripple. Roth doesn't let it all go too deeply into contemporary racial politics while by comparison he gives ample time for Council to ruminate on his responsibility for his son's incarceration for armed robbery. Even the conflict between Martin's cop brother's desire for revenge and Council's attempts to keep his blue-collar burb of Gannon out of the project is underdeveloped, apparently left among the editing ruins.

A nice touch is the presence of a volunteer group looking for missing children, headed by Edie Falco's Karen Collucci, who has a missing child for 10 years. The group offers a sane oasis amid the fire of the social tensions, and Collucci offers advice and insight far ahead of any smart detective's. Falco upstages Jackson with a gritty sincerity and cool that could win her mayor of Manhattan if she so wished.

Freedomland turns on social tension but never gives it a chance to flourish. The issues are lost like the child among too much Martin moaning

Samuel L. Jackson plays the role as Lorenzo Council a detective in charge of a bad housing project and one night the racial tensions were ready to explode. A young lady, Julianne Moore, (Brenda Martin) approaches Lorenzo and is in a frantic condition, saying that someone stole her young boy of 4 years. There is immediate concern for this child and this sparks off problems in the project, because many Black children do not get this kind of attention. Day in and day out the search continues in many parks and then their attention is focused on an abandoned orphanage in a place called Freedomland. Lorenzo begins to get upset with all the trouble this situation is causing among the people and harm can come to all these people. You will never be able to guess the ending and if you like Samuel L. Jackson and Julianne Moore, don't miss this film, they both were great.

First mistake of this film was marketing (after all, it's all about marketing) Billing it as a thriller/action movie with some paranormal slant was wrong. This is strictly a psychological drama with zero paranormal stuff in it.

Second mistake was to make reality too real and not idealized or artistic to stay away of the touchy issues addressed: Race, police prejudice, social differences.

So if you went to the movie theater or the rental place to watch a thrilling action film staying right on the surface of entertainment and shock value, you will be disappointed. This is a nicely acted, well constructed and most importantly, realistic drama in which a white woman blames the kidnap of her son as a carjack conducted by an African-American male.

As far as I am concern, there was no stereotyping, just realism. There was no siding on the moralistic virtues of one or other side. Actually, this is a quite profound exploration of the reasons to lie, the be racist, to fear prejudice and to resist the fact that a social interaction between poor and rich, white and black, civilian and policemen will probably be fair in a near future… not now.

My only concern was to see Ms. Moore so stressed during 90% of the film, quite impressive performance. Just hope she doesn't take this as her type-cast.

Detective Lorenzo Council (Samuel Jackson) must separate the truth from the lies when a troubled woman (Julianne Moore) shows up at the emergency room claiming that a black man from the projects carjacked her, taking her 4-year-old son, who was sleeping in the back seat.

Freedomland is a disappointing film that fails to take advantage of its talented cast and intriguing premise. The movie fails because Joe Roth is a terrible director. He tries to handle a bunch of different issues and he just doesn't mix them very well. He also introduces different characters and subplots but he doesn't build on them. Also, for a movie tackling serious issues, it was pretty unrealistic. The whole lock-down scenario was completely over the top and unnecessary. The kidnapping story had a bunch of holes and the way the cops handled the situation was pretty irresponsible. All the characters were stereotypes and most of them were unlikable. There were a lot of scenes dealing with racism but the film never actually dealt with them or settled them. The ending was total letdown and very little was actually settled, making the whole movie experience pointless.

The acting is the film's only strong point with Samuel L. Jackson giving the best performance. His performance felt a little familiar but it was still effective and his emotions never felt forced. Julianne Moore went completely over the top with her performance. She was annoying and completely unrealistic. Also, it was hard to feel sorry for her character because she was so unlikable and her actions were just terrible. Edie Falco came out of nowhere and she gave a pretty moving performance. She played the only likable character in the film and it was easy to feel sorry for her. The rest of the supporting actors were below average and no one else broke out.

Along with the acting, there were a few other good things about the film. There were a couple of engaging scenes that could have been better if the director had built on them. The script was also decent and it could have been turned into a good film. The movie also had an interesting style to it and at least it sort of engages the viewer. While the film was pretty messy, it held my attention until the end. Of course, the performances helped with that but the storyline had a chance to build. Unfortunately, it didn't and the movie ends with a whimper. In the end, Freedomland is an annoying melodrama with very few redeeming qualities. Rating 4/10

"Freedomland" will not be a popular movie. The movie doesn't have enough action and the action is does contain is more to promote a message than to titillate. Its message is basically about inner city racism. Its about the fuss made over a missing white child in a black community. The story is about a white women who was car-jacked in a housing project and, unknown to the jacker, her 4 year old son was in the car's back seat. You'll have to see the movie to see the rest since revealing the story would completely ruin the movie. I really enjoyed this movie. I thought the performances by Samuel Jackson, William Forsythe and Ron Eldard were realistic and affecting. One standout was Edie Falco. She played a very unglamorous role and was powerfully affecting. She should get an Academy Award nomination for this role. She was fabulous. Another standout was Julianne Moore who was very miscast. I did not like her in this role. She played a very weak, flawed and emotionally stunted individual whose behavior at times turned my stomach. I did not like the character. The character was not written to be liked, maybe pitied and I think that aspect is what Ms. Moore was trying to evoke. I think she did too good a job at making her character weak and flawed and missed a toughness that the book's character had. To live in the environment that she did she would have acquired more emotional survival skills than the movie's character portrayed. Ms. Moore's character looked like she wandered onto the set from a suburban mall. Her looks and demeanor next to the strong Black women characters made her appear too weak and her obstinacy appears to be more stupidity. I think Edie Falco could have played this role better with her strength and then the revelations and breakdown when the toughness crumbled would have been more effective. The movie is unfortunately being advertised as a thriller and audiences expecting action and things blowing up will be disappointed. "Freedomland" is one of those movies that Hollywood doesn't get or know what to do with but it is a very worthwhile movie to see. I gave it a 7 out 10. I downgraded it slightly because of Ms. Moore's performance.