A True Story

Rating: 7/10 (20 December 2015)

This real-life story is about as out-of-this-world as one might imagine: a mother's child goes missing. The police find a child who is not her son, but they claim he is. She fights as best she can and... they put her in a mental hospital.
I wouldn't believe it if I didn't know it happened.
It surprises me, however, that so much talent on board couldn't produce a better effort. Angelina Jolie has never really lit up the screen for me, and she continues that trend here. It's clear her and Clint talked up directing during this film, as it has a similar vague story structure and oddly-high-def 1940s vibe as Jolie's "Unbroken."
But really, it was the story that made this film. That it was so interesting, so filled with emotion, any film made from it could not possibly make it boring. The problem is that it feels a bit too real. It doesn't follow a traditional story arc, and as such just meanders along. The twists and turns aren't particularly surprising, not least of which because most of them are loudly telegraphed ("bring her in the back entrance," says the police chief about to commit Jolie to the Asylum).
In the end, as in real life, there isn't really a conclusion. The boy was never found. Many plots are left dangling: who is the man who leaves the impostor boy in the first place? what is the impostor's motive?
In the hands of a better director, I think this story would've made a classic film. As it stands, it feels lazy on the director's part. Eastwood's films are full of awkward, artificially-extended silences interspersed with scenes of intense violence. He's continued this pattern throughout most of his films. "American Sniper," for example, with its home scenes juxtaposed with the battlefield. Eastwood expects his audience to know his characters' motivations. We are forced to stick to his archaic good-vs-evil spaghetti-western style, which works sometimes (Gran Torino) but mostly falls flat (Sniper, Changeling). His films are simply watchable. Not much stands out for me in this film except, again, the story itself is just remarkable. It's too bad Eastwood didn't give it the love it needed.