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Changeling
Universal Pictures


8.0

based on 38 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 66 votes
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FILM:

MPAA RATING: R for some violent and disturbing content, and language

Starring Angelina Jolie, John Malkovich, Jeffrey Donovan, Colm Feore, Amy Ryan, and Michael Kelly

Los Angeles, 1928: On a Saturday morning in a working-class suburb, Christine said goodbye to her son, Walter, and left for work. When she came home, she discovered he had vanished. A fruitless search ensues, and months later, a boy claiming to be the nine-year-old is returned. Dazed by the swirl of cops, reporters and her conflicted emotions, Christine allows him to stay overnight. But in her heart, she knows he is not Walter. As she pushes authorities to keep looking, she learns that in Prohibition-era L.A., women don't challenge the system and live to tell their story. Slandered as delusional and unfit, Christine finds an ally in activist Reverend Briegleb, who helps her fight the city to look for her missing boy. Based on the actual incident that rocked California's legal system, Changeling tells the shocking tale of a mother's quest to find her son, and those who won't stop until they silence her. (Universal Pictures)

GENRE(S):	Crime \| Drama \| Mystery
WRITTEN BY:	J. Michael Straczynski
DIRECTED BY:	Clint Eastwood
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: February 17, 2009 Theatrical: October 24, 2008
RUNNING TIME:	140 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

Variety Todd McCarthy

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.

100

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

A disturbing film about grim subject matter, but the overall experience is more exhilarating than saddening. There's just something satisfying about seeing a movie so well made.

100

Empire Damon Wise

A compelling, adult period thriller, with an Oscar-assured performance from Angelina Jolie.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Changeling doesn't care if you love it or hate it, it makes no compromises to fashion and it's charged with that unmistakable assurance of a master filmmaker at his creative peak.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

In Changeling Eastwood continues to probe uncomfortable subjects to depict the individual and even existential struggle to do what is right.

Newsweek David Ansen

Eastwood tells his haunting, sorrowful saga with such a sure, steady hand, only a very hardened cynic could fail to be moved.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

This incredible but true story marks the first time Eastwood's signature themes have found expression in a woman's experience, and the absence of any distracting machismo only heightens his sense of helpless rage at the perpetual anguish of victims' families.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Another remarkable addition to Eastwood's directorial canon.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Jolie, Malkovich and Geoff Pierson, as a lawyer who takes Collins' case before the Police Board, are very good at what they do very well. The film's most riveting performance is by Jason Butler Harner as the murderous Gordon Northcott.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Jolie is inspired casting. She plays the role like a gathering storm, moving from terror to a fierce resolve. And Eastwood, at the peak of his artful powers, tightens the screws of suspense without ever forgetting where the heart of his film lies.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

In other hands, these clashes of good and evil might have seemed ordinary, but Eastwood makes Changeling a hard story to shake off. To see this film is to understand both how fragile and how essential our hopes for decency and truth are in a world that must be made to care about either one.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

Changeling is an almost universally impressive all-around effort, and is the best "dirty underbelly of Los Angeles" movie since "L.A. Confidential."

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

The movie has an epic sweep but an intimate, personal feel. If Changeling lacks the knockout power of, say, "Million Dollar Baby," it proves that Eastwood continues to seek out stories that take him places he hasn't been before -- and the audience along with him.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

Changeling fundamentally works; it holds you. But these issues of texture and detail matter too, and they hold clues as to why Eastwood's latest is a good, solid achievement rather than a great, grieving one.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Eastwood creates a tone that's at once stately and unsettling, allowing a lot of breathing room for Jolie's sad, unyielding performance. She anchors a film that needs an anchor the further it goes along.

The New Yorker David Denby

Changeling is beautifully wrought, but it has the abiding fault of righteously indignant filmmaking: it congratulates us for feeling what we already feel.

Time Richard Corliss

In its purposeful accumulation of depravities, both individual and institutional, the director's non-style has an honorable payoff that's rare in modern Hollywood cinema: the story's weight could come close to burying you in despair.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Eastwood gets all noirish for us but, like Jolie's performance, there's a rote quality to it all. Even the mournful little ditties that Eastwood composed for the soundtrack seem canned.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

While components of Eastwood's film are excellent, in particular Kelly's quietly tenacious performance and the evocative period details, Changeling is a film of parts, not a unified whole.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

While Straczynski should be commended for remaining reasonably true to the historical record, this results in an open-ended conclusion that isn't entirely satisfying.

USA Today Claudia Puig

While the neo-Gothic tale is inherently intriguing, the film should inspire strong emotion, but deliberate pacing and a contained sense of melodrama make it a surprisingly passive experience.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

No matter how strange it gets, or how distorted for political gain or refined for religious purposes, its essence is hard to pin down, even after a 2 1/2 -hour search.

TV Guide Jason Buchanan

Perhaps with a few more drafts, the filmmakers could have found a means of maintaining the quiet momentum displayed early on, but as it stands, Changeling is little more than a frustrating missed opportunity that's dressed to the nines, but a day late for the party.

Slate Dana Stevens

All of Eastwood's rigorous craftsmanship seems wasted on a movie whose message never rises above the bumper-sticker admonition that "mean people suck."

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

The script is compelling, the direction confident, the production values professional. But it does not, in the end, feel real.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

The truth about the case of Christine Collins is so shocking and dramatic that embellishment must have seemed pointless, but in sticking so close to the historical record, Mr. Straczynski and Mr. Eastwood have produced a distended, awkward narrative whose strongest themes are lost in the murky pomp of period detail.

Washington Post John Anderson

Despite a mysterious title, Changeling isn't a mystery. It is, occasionally, agony.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Burdened by a convoluted script and an ensemble-proof leading lady, the director fails to illuminate a particular corrupt system.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

The trouble with Changeling is that it plays less like reality than like a bare-bones, moralistic rehash of other, better movies, such as "L.A. Confidential" or "Frances."

Dallas Observer Ella Taylor

Biblically classical, tastefully vintage with aerial shots of wet umbrellas and Homburg hats and not a little staid considering its sensational source material, Changeling isn't so much dull as it is an open book.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

As Changeling strains toward its mawkishly optimistic conclusion, the old-fashioned moviemaking that Eastwood settled into doesn't suit either him or his star. It feels like a corny joke.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

An extremely weird and frustrating viewing experience. I think it's that way because Eastwood, 78, can't be bothered to wrangle the vast material into a tighter shape.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Eastwood's grim handling of even grimmer subject matter could have used some paring down toward its histrionic ending, but Changeling is still one of the director's most assured and engaging historical horror shows.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

The result is a film that plays like a creaking melodrama, with good guys and bad guys and precious little in between.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

A glum, listless affair that springs to life now and then, only to sag back into its saggy, depressive cushion.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

A brazen title card declares this " true story." (Wow, not even "based on.") However many facts may be accurate, the movie feels contrived, with climax piled upon climax.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

J. Michael Straczynski's disjointed script manages to ring false at almost every significant turn (Collins' psychiatric-hospital stay has grown into a latter-day version of "The Snake Pit") and Clint Eastwood's ponderous direction -- a disheartening departure from his sure touch in "Letters From Iwo Jima" and "The Bridges of Madison County" -- magnifies the flaws.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

It would be a horrific story even if underplayed, but Eastwood shoots it like a horror movie.

The average user rating for this movie is 8.0 (out of 10) based on 66 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

steven r gave it a9:
Call me naive, but If it wasn't true, I would not have believed that people could be so inconsiderate, so uncaring, so ruthless, and that LA could have been that corrupt. This film belongs to Ms. Jolie who was magnificent, Mr. Eastwood, I was engrossed from the beginning, and all those behind the scenes who made me feel like I was in the 20's and 30's. It is important for all to see: men to realize how their forefathers treated women and for women to know how brave those who paved the way were. I reserve a 10 for the greatest of all time, this is a 9.9!

Paul C gave it a0:
I feel compelled to cast my first ever viewer vote here at metacritic.com because this is absolutely one of the worst movies I've seen in my entire life. Interestingly, I knew little about the film and did not know who had directed it while watching, and was mildly shocked at the end to see Clint Eastwood's name roll through the credit as director. As much as I loved "Unforgiven", you, Clint, are unforgiven for this horrible mess of a film. Grossly overwritten, every line tries it's damnedest to impart extreme gravitas or pith. And every one of these horribly cheesy lines is delivered by a walking piece of cardboard character. Jolie, cue the tears, nominated for best actress? Please, maybe a nomination for best weight-loss not required by a role. The only engaging character of the movie was the killer himself, who imbued his part with the appropriate creepiness that this movie fully deserved. I honestly, honestly have never seen a movie with this level of budget, actors and director be so miserably overwritten, consequently overacted, with an enraging attempt at sentimentality as it desperately tries to salvage itself through emotional manipulation strangely in bed with pure shock value.

T F gave it a6:
Not as good as I thought it would be. The story is very compelling, but there is no way Jolie's performance should have been nominated for an Oscar.

Robert I. gave it a7:
Real life trumps fiction, and Eastwood's film serves us a cautionary tale drawn from actual events. When, it asks, can we ever be safe, when human malice (or evil) lurks around us? Surprisingly good.

Dan F gave it a9:
A very good movie. Jolie and Jason Butler Harner knock it out of the park. The plot that starts simple, and then branches out in numerous directions - because the true story that it is based on did the same. Although a long movie, I was intrigued throughout it.

Skip Y. gave it a4:
Eastwood doesn't know the meaning of the word "subtle". He always makes sure the dimmest person in the audience is never in doubt of which characters are 100% good and which ones are 100% evil. Every single employee at the psych hospital acts like they're villians in a Superman comic book. With the exception of Jolie, the film was filled with MOVIE characters, not real people. The irony is that this is a true story, yet I never believed a minute of Eastwood's film. He had a fascinating story to work with, and I'm glad to know the story, but as a film it was little better than a made-for-TV movie. He seems to be afraid of challenging his audience, so he ends up insulting our intelligence. At the end he spoon-feeds us even our emotional response, making it clear that we're supposed to feel good about the outcome, even though, when you think about it, it's really not a happy ending.

Jay H. gave it a7:
Beautifully made, a real effort was made towards the period detail. Angelina Jolie is indeed great. It's biggest flaw was it being too long, there were a few stretches that dragged a bit that should have been edited out. Fine costumes and art direction.

Changeling Universal Pictures

Changeling
Universal Pictures