[yasr_overall_rating]
New Jersey police lieutenant, Laurel Hester, and her registered domestic partner, Stacie Andree, both battle to secure Hester’s pension benefits when she is diagnosed with terminal cancer.
Progression is moving ahead with full steam in America and it is long overdue. A movie such as “Freeheld” seems to be the right direction for catching the eye of both critic and viewer. The premise behind the movie is in itself beautiful. Equality should be given to everyone and not reserved for those who fall into a certain categories. The delivery of this message is a little blurry from time to time in that the movie seems to bleed into the right to marry rather than the right to equality but it is still a step in the right direction for social commentary on an important issue.
“Freeheld” tells the story of Laurel Hester (Julianne Moore), a lieutenant in the county’s police force and her partner Stacie Andree (Ellen Page). The two struggle to get the county to release Laurel’s pension to Stacie after she finds out she has stage 4 cancer.
Julianne Moore and Ellen Page have incredible chemistry in this film and really grasp the characters well but the “stereotypical lesbian couple” look takes away from the aura of sincerity creating a slight Hallmark movie appearance. It is apparent that Moore’s talent that we saw in earlier movies was reduced in “Freeheld.” She has to deal with a script that provides little detail into the character’s backstory and shallow attempts to dive into the emotional connection that Laurel and Stacie have but she navigates the waters and pulls off the role well. It seems as though the plan was to allow Page to have a bigger impact than she did. A large portion of the film was dedicated to showing that Stacie could survive and even dominate in a man’s world. The remaining scenes in which she was a part of, were reduced to either her sitting quietly aside, crying, or having little impact in the conversation at all. Page could have been a vital support instead of a secondary character but the script just didn’t seem to account for her weight as an actress.
Besides Moore, Page, and Shannon, the rest of the cast seemed to drag the movie down. It was understood that Steve Carell was there for comedic effect on an emotionally heavy story but it could have been subtle like that in “Crazy, Stupid, Love.” Instead, he is over the top just as the others are taking you out of the depths of the story and into a distorted version of what the film could have been. It is questionable how Peter Sollett and Ron Nyswaner let these versions of the characters exist and they were clichéd and unnecessary.
The emotion of this movie will still hit hard and the message is one that cannot be ignored. The film will be enjoyed by many but the subtle flaws in the look of the characters and the weak script is something that will keep this movie from being an all-time favorite.
In select theaters now
