Dark, confronting but thoroughly engaging.

Rating: 8/10 (15 February 2009)

This is the first movie I've seen starring Angelina Jolie (the only other movie I've seen her in is 'Beowulf', which doesn't really provide much to compare) and I think that enabled me to see this film without any ingrained expectations or prejudices because I didn't really know what to expect from Jolie or Eastwood.
In saying that, I thoroughly enjoyed this film and even as it leant towards the three hour mark, I really didn't want it to end because, besides being fiercely involved in the film, I still harboured an idealistic hope that all would be well. I think that even though it was indeed a very dark and bleak film, it wasn't one which outstayed it's welcome by becoming tediously gloomy, because, besides handling the subject matter in a fashion that didn't become completely suffocating, it also compensated the darkness with a grimly bittersweet conclusion and a somewhat hopeful outlook on humanity as not being 'all bad'. In other words, the film delves deeply into the very worst aspects of human action and feeling before eventually resolving to the better, more compassionate aspects to leave us with the view that while some people are terrible, there are good people and there is hope. As Jolie's character, Christine Collins puts it in the last minutes of the film.
I felt that some of the aspects of this film were so horrific and graphic that they almost touched on Horror in a way. In that way, because some of the subject matter was so gruesome and confronting, it did make it almost unbelievable. After seeing an emotionally charged, dramatic, deeply intense movie like Revolutionary Road and then seeing Changeling, I found that while the subject matter in Changeling was somewhat more horrible, it didn't affect me so much or discomfort me as much. Mostly, I think, because the events were beyond what we expect to be confronted with in a civilised society: the murder of innocent children, a police force which condones violence and terror, the abuse of a mother at her most vulnerable are all things we find almost too horrific to believe and are ones we can't really relate to unless we've been in a similar circumstance, which I hope is not the case.
In saying that, the emotion was very real. The tension and unease were beautifully used to keep the audience on tenterhooks throughout the movie, always hoping that just around the corner would be Walter Collins, because we follow Christine through so much pain, fear and anguish. Despite this film's subject matter, I did enjoy it and that's not something you can often say about a film containing these sorts of events. The ending message, while certainly not a Hollywood happy ending, was one which really finished off a brilliant movie on a bittersweet, hopeful tone, but one which does not attempt to undo the horrors which unfold in this very unique and enthralling film. Jolie, by the way, was brilliant and I certainly will be keeping an eye out for her in the future to see if she can perform this well again.