Angelina Jolie is a Cannes Changeling

yeah she is beautiful, but she is also a *****. Brad was married when they first hooked up.

Beautiful. Here is hoping for an excellent Cannes reward.

Angie looks so beautiful and nice to see CE and PG.

Thanks for the new thread Jared.

Top-notch performance … Variety

Congratulations Angie!

# 21 tabitha @ 05/20/2008 at 7:09 am
I still think the babies will be born no later than late July.
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You might be right, esp. if she’s due Aug 19, it’s a known fact women give birth 3 weeks to 1 month early when carrying twins.

Variety review
By TODD MCCARTHY

A thematic companion piece to “Mystic River” but more complex and far-reaching, “Changeling” impressively continues Clint Eastwood’s great run of ambitious late-career pictures. Emotionally powerful and stylistically sure-handed, this true story-inspired drama begins small with the disappearance of a young boy, only to gradually fan out to become a comprehensive critique of the entire power structure of Los Angeles, circa 1928. Graced by a top-notch performance from Angelina Jolie, the Universal release looks poised to do some serious business upon tentatively scheduled opening late in the year.
Constructed around the infamous “Wineville Chicken Murders” in Riverside County, Calif., which achieved great notoriety at the time and, surprisingly, have never inspired a film before, the outstanding screenplay by J. Michael Straczynski (creator of TV’s “Babylon 5″) has deceptive simplicity and ambition to it, qualities the director honors by underplaying the melodrama and not signaling the story’s eventual dimensions at the outset. Characters and sociopolitical elements are introduced with almost breathtaking deliberation, as dramatic force and artistic substance steadily mount across the long-arc running time.

With a melancholy mood set by Eastwood’s typically spare guitar-and-piano score, the languid opening stretch stresses the ordinary nature of life for single mother Christine Collins (Jolie) and her 10-year-old son Walter (Gattlin Griffith), who share a modest house in a quiet neighborhood in Los Angeles. Christine has the photogenic job of telephone supervisor on roller-skates, overseeing dozens of female operators as they connect calls at a giant switchboard. Early sound films were loaded with scenes of smart-talking women handling phone lines; Eastwood takes advantage of the inspiration of skates to cover them in neat tracking shots.

One day when Christine is late getting home from work, Walter is gone. Nearly five months later, Christine is informed that her son has been found in Illinois. With all attendant hoopla for the benefit of the press and police, a reunion is arranged at the train station, but, as soon as the boy steps onto the platform, Christine knows this kid is not her son.

The police, fronted by Capt. J.J. Jones (Jeffrey Donovan), insist otherwise, waving off definitive evidence relating to physical discrepancies. Even when Walter’s dentist, teacher and fellow students insist he’s not the right boy, the replacement himself remains maddeningly resolute, driving the otherwise level-headed Christine to distraction.

Or at least that’s the way it looks to the cops, who promptly throw her in the psycho ward for her alleged delusion. Fears that the story is now destined to veer off into “The Snake Pit” or, given Jolie’s presence, “Girl, Interrupted” looney-bin horrors prove largely unfounded, despite a couple of brief electroshock scenes. Rather, this is where the picture really spreads its wings, as ramifications of this tragic but unexceptional case seep through the police department, the legal system, the medical establishment and City Hall in entirely unexpected ways.

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Initially, this is due to the tireless efforts of a crusading radio evangelist, the Rev. Gustav Briegleb (an intent, focused John Malkovich), one of whose missions is to expose what he sees as the complete corruption of the LAPD under Chief James E. Davis (Colm Feore). On Christine’s side from the beginning, the pastor persists in using her case to spotlight the department’s malfeasance, and the character is notable as one of the few screen depictions of a righteous Christian leader of this period (the era of Aimee Semple McPherson) to be cast in an entirely favorable light.

Irrevocably setting the judicial machinery in motion is a boy in his early teens (Eddie Alderson, extraordinary) who movingly tells police about some horrific murders of kidnapped boys he’s unwillingly participated in with an unhinged young man, Gordon Northcott (Jason Butler Harner), out in the desert. What happens next — to Capt. Jones, the police chief, the mayor and the murderers, among others — is all part of the public record and the less than salubrious history of Los Angeles politics.

The intercutting of two heavyweight proceedings, a murder trial and a landmark City Hall hearing, provide the story’s dramatic crescendo, although even greater tension stems from what comes thereafter. In the end, “Changeling” joins the likes of “Chinatown” and “L.A. Confidential” as a sorrowful critique of the city’s political culture.

A dozen filmmakers could have taken a dozen different approaches to the same material — sensationalistic, melodramatic, expose-minded, a kid’s or killer’s p.o.v., and so on. Perhaps the best way to describe Eastwood’s approach is that he’s extremely attentive — to the central elements of the story, to be sure (with its echoes of “A Perfect World”), but also to the fluidity between the private and the public, the arbitrariness of life and death, the distinct ways different people view the same thing, the destructive behavior of some adults toward children and the quality of life in California around the time he was born.

Despite the material’s dark themes, the Los Angeles setting helps make “Changeling” one of Eastwood’s most visually vivid films; cinematographer Tom Stern’s mobile camera has a graceful elegance, and several panoramic CGI vistas merge smoothly with location lensing to unemphatically evoke the dustier, less congested city of 80 years ago. Production designer James J. Murakami’s many sets impressively create a constant play of light and dark environments, and further period verisimilitude stems from Deborah Hopper’s costumes and the occasional presence of the extinct Red Car trolleys.

As she did in “A Mighty Heart,” Jolie plays a woman abruptly and agonizingly deprived of the person closest to her. But impressive as she may have been as the wife of Danny Pearl, her performance here hits home more directly due to the lack of affectation — no accent, frizzed hair or darkened complexion, and no attempt to consciously rein in emotion. There are inevitable one-note aspects to her Christine Collins, as she must exasperatedly repeat her positions to the authorities again and again. But Jolie makes it clear Christine maintains a grip on her sanity in the face of many assaults on its stability.

Pic offers a wealth of sterling supporting turns, from significant ones down to fleeting bit parts. The pressure felt by the police to toe the party line is deftly expressed in different ways by Donovan, Feore and Michael Kelly, the latter very fine as the cop who unearths the evidence at the murder site. Harner is startlingly unpredictable as the showboating but wimpy killer, while Geoff Pierson is commandingly charismatic as the eminent lawyer who calls the city big shots to account.

Postscript noting the fates of certain characters conveniently elides the sad and/or ironic destinies awaiting some of them.

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Good luck on your new movies…… You & your family are truly blessed because you share to others your blessings.

Reviews are great! I’m so excited! I can’t believe how long I will have to wait to see this movie. but the AJ picts are a brilliant consolation prize. LOL!

Next RC picts! Be warned Alia, I might start dancing. So excited!

Lets just enjoy the reviews any awards that will come will come.

Yep @ 05/20/2008 at 7:19 am Emanuel Levy gave ‘ A ‘ to this film
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link please
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I somehow could n’t put his address on Jared.
Here is all of his review.

Changeling, A
Cannes Film Fest 2008 (In Competition)–Clint Eastwood had done it again. Dramatically and artistically, his new period thriller, “The Changeling,” based on an actual case that helped bring down a corrupt police force and ushered a new era of greater legal equality, is right up there with his seminal, Oscar-winning features, “Mystic River” in 2003 and “Million Dollar Baby” in 2004

Though a historical piece set in the particular socio-cultural context–Los Angeles in March 1928–”The Changeling” is a dramatically gripping, supremely acted, technically accomplished picture that bears relevant contemporary meanings due to its central set of significant issues that continues to resonate in our lives today: the definition and structure of family as a social institution, the ineffectiveness and corruption of our main guardian institution, the police force. Add to it a strong female protagonist (splendidly played by Angelina Jolie), who begins as a misfit and weakling only to find strong reserves within herself and become a genuine heroine, and you also have a film about the nascent feminist movements of the late 1920s, with insights about the position of women (and other minorities) in society back then, with strong implications for today.

Clearly on a roll over the past decade, in which he has helmed “Mystic River,” “Million Dollar Baby,” and the back to back war films that are really companion pieces, “Flags of Our Fathers” and “Letters from Iwo Jima,” Eastwood is like a good old French wine, the more senior he gets in age and experience, the better, deeper, and more resonant is his work.

At 78, Eastwood is at the prime of his career. With the notable exception of John Huston, who had done some good films in his 70s and up to his death (”Wise Blood,” “Prizzi’s Honor,” “The Dead,” his very last picture), it’s hard to think of another major American director who has continues to evolve and sharpen his already commanding skills by applying them to a diversity of genres and stories.

The collaboration of Eastwood, who here relies again on his long-time crew of cinematographer Tom Stern and editor Joel Cox, screenwriter J. Michael Straczynski (who amazingly comes from journalism and TV), and actress Angelina Jolie, who gives a stronger dramatic performance in this picture than in “A Mighty Heart” last year, results in one of the bets pictures to be seen in Cannes Fest. Indeed, as of Day 7, “Changeling” impresses as one of the highlights of a rather lukewarm competition. Alongside Desplechin’s delirious French ensemble film “A Christmas Tale and the Turkish entry “Three Monkeys,” it’s one of the top contenders for the prestigious prize Palme d’Or.

Universal will bow the film in the late fall, the prime season for serious “meaty” movies and Oscar contenders. With strong critical support and the right handling and marketing, “The Changeling” has a good chance to receive multiple Oscar nominations in the most important categories: Picture, Director, Screenplay, Actress, and several Supporting Actors. (I realize this is only late May, but the same prediction was made in this column last year out of Cannes Fest for the Coen brothers’ “No Country for Old Men” and Schnabel’s “The Diving Bell”).

Before I begin my analysis, a word about the title and context of viewing Eastwood’s landmark movie. In French, the film is called “L’echange,” which translates into “The Exchange,” a better, more apt title than “The Changeling,” which brings connotations of the horror genre; the movie has its share of horrific moments but it certainly is not a horror flick.

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Can’t wait to see this movie.

Yeah Angelna Jolie is truly BLESS. and you know why? Despite all the hates and all the despicable comments that you haters thrown at her she turns her other cheek. She continues to do good to those less unfortunate people in the world and live her life happy and content with her family and the man she loves. The more you trolls/haters hate her the more she will be BLESS. Truly Angelina Jolie is a woman of SUBSTANCE!