Freedomland

Film: Jackson tackles race relations, stuff in new film
Nick Pannu, The Peak

Media savvy pundits have recently shed light on how social policy elicits indifference towards marginalised people and the dire consequences of such policy (ie. New Orleans).

As well, how calamitic racial tensions tend to escalate within this realm. Conveniently, or perhaps with undeniable conviction, writer Richard Price and director Joe Roth boldly attempt to present the issue within their latest collaboration, Freedomland. An all-star cast, which includes Samuel Jackson, Julianne Moore, and William Forsythe, acts as a smoke screen to what otherwise could have been a very promising film.

Immediately a distraught, disenfranchised woman Brenda, played by Julianne Moore, is seen wandering the streets. She is confronted by Samuel Jackson’s character, Detective Lorezna, who desperately tries to find out what happened to her while she is being attended to by medical staff. Suddenly, napalm seeps through the tranquility and viciously erupts thereafter permeating every aspect of the movie. For example, Brenda was carjacked while her son was sleeping in the back seat. Yet the real issue presented in the film is not that her son was in the car when it was stolen but that she identifies a black man as the culprit. Finding the boy is essential towards diffusing a situation which will have dire consequences on a poor, predominately African-American neighbourhood where the car was jacked.

The plot thickens as the case turns out to be more complicated then expected. Brenda is not being forthright and for some reason is holding something back. As well, her brother is an officer in the neighbouring white neighbourhood of Ghana who sets up a barricade in the projects so no one can leave. Having strong ties to people in the community, Lorezna desperately seeks to diffuse the situation by having Brenda unconditionally surrender the pivotal information required to subdue erupting racial tensions between both neighbourhoods.

Initially and until near the end, the plot, as well as what seemed like the theme, was well orchestrated. Unfortunately, there were many implied gestures and circumstances that didn’t necessarily tie together. It seemed like the true essence of what the picture was emphasising was sabotaged. The prominent emphasis on the corrupt, vile approach that the police bureaucracy generally takes with poor marginalised people is subdued by ambiguous swerves. Near the end, not the very last scene, there is a cheesy dialogue between Lorezna and his partner, played by an under-utilised William Forsythe. The displaced issue was not cohesive with respect to the rest of the film. Also, their relationship was never built up enough in the film to communicate such a scene.

Samuel Jackson and Julianne Moore’s roles are convincing and genuine with respect to their characters, but Forsythe is totally under-utilised in this film. His scenes were limited and he was a pivotal character. It would made for an interesting dynamic to place Forsythe as the low self-worthing brother of Moore and antagonist cop setting up the barricade against Jackson’s beloved and esteemed Armstrong projects. Again, the plot was enriched, but the corny and ambiguous ending delegitimises the movie. Mysteriously, it seems that the movie had to be tweaked near the end so the emphasis on the vile, fascist liberties that the police bureaucracy typically takes on the disenfranchised and poor would be buried. People had to walk away from the film not thinking about that issue