Grade: B+ | Genre: Drama Summary: In all, Changeling is a very good film. Angelina Jolie's performance alone is worth the price of admission, and Clint's cinematic flare really props up this film. While its story makes it fall short of being a great movie, it is definitely one that needed to have been told. There are a few things you can count on in this life outside of death and taxes. The Cubs will never win the World Series, no one will ever date Jessica Simpson for her brains and Clint Eastwood will always direct a quality motion picture. Whether it be Unforgiven, Mystic River or Million Dollar Baby, Eastwood never short sheets the bed. He faces a subject head on, and drops all those uncomfortable, real moments on the table to make his audience squirm like any great filmmaker should. Dirty Harry has a knack for telling the tough stories normally reserved for the likes of Scorsese and Coppola. With the release of each work, Eastwood continues to evolve into one of this generations great directors. The complex drama Changeling cuts at a parents worst nightmare -- losing a child.

In this true story pulled off the news headlines of the Los Angeles Times in the 1920s, Christine Collins (Angelina Jolie) adores her eight-year-old son Walter (Gattlin Griffith) more than the boundaries of her heart. He is her life, and she works hard as a switchboard supervisor to provide for him as a single mother. One afternoon, she gets a call to fill in a shift at work. After some initial resistance, she agrees to come in for a few hours to help out, leaving young Walter to look out for himself for the afternoon. Even though this seems a bit shocking in these times where the nightly news is plagued by murder, in this more idyllic setting of the 1920s, the thought that danger and harm might come to Walter, either from himself or by others, wasn't even really a second thought to Christine.

The police finally call Christine to tell her a break has been made in the case, and Walter was found in the company of a drifter in Dekalb, Illinois. The police train him across the country with Christine awaiting his arrival with sufficiently baited breathe. The only problem is this child isn't Walter. He's just some boy who vaguely looks like him and who claims to be him. Her initial protests fall on deaf ears as the cops aren't willing to take the bad press to admit they had made a mistake. As far as they're concerned, Walter has been returned to his mother -- case closed. Meanwhile, Christine has to take this alien child home with her and take care of him as if he were her own while screaming from the rooftops to anyone that will listen that this is not her son.

Angelina Jolie is particularly good in this film. With fantastic performances in Girl, Interrupted and A Mighty Heart, it should come as no great surprise that Jolie has the acting chops to stand alongside some of the great actresses of the modern age. I think we tend to forget her range as she's more often packaged for her raw sex appeal in films like Mr. & Mrs. Smith and Wanted. In the hands of Jolie, we see this terrible struggle slowly tearing Christine asunder. The police spend every waking minute convincing her that she is crazy and intent on shirking her responsibilities as a mother while her son is lost and no one is looking for him. Jolie has already started gathering hardware nominations for her performance in Changeling including Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Awards. Don't be surprised when Oscar comes a calling.

The film as a whole is a very compelling one. Eastwood's soft touches are all over this film. The period elements were done precisely and grounded this film in that reality very nicely. Outside of Jolie, the supporting cast is top notch and compliment her eternal struggle well. The film's primary drawback is the pacing and the story. After watching it, you get the feeling that this would have been a great book, but the stories' overall complexity shoehorned too much into this film. At times, scenes feel disjointed and rushed. At several points near the film's conclusion, the ending felt upon us only for the story continue on to tell another piece of the puzzle.

In all, Changeling is a very good film. Angelina Jolie's performance alone is worth the price of admission, and Clint's cinematic flare really props up this film. While its story makes it fall short of being a great movie, it is definitely one that needed to have been told. The perseverance and fight that compelled Christine to never give up should serve as an inspiration to us all. We all have battles in our life no matter how grand or small. Some are worth fighting for until our last breath.

Release Date: October 31, 2008