I wrote briefly about Clint Eastwood’s upcoming film The Changeling, in yesterday’s column 55 Must See Movies of 2008. It looks like a few more actors have been cast in the project: Jeffrey Donovan, Colm Feore and John Malkovich.
A mother’s (Angelina Jolie) prayer for her kidnapped son to return home is answered, though it doesn’t take long for her to suspect the boy who comes back is not hers. The woman is thrown into an insane asylum for disagreeing with the LAPD. When it seems that her real son has been murdered by a child serial killer and the child returned admits to fraud, she takes her case to the city council and takes down the mayor, the police chief and several corrupt officers, concurrently sparking changes in the insanity legislation. Donovan will play a police captain, Feore the chief of police and Malkovich a reverend.
Eastwood has a great track record (if that wasn’t an obvious observation, I don’t know what is), and this sounds like his next hit. The Changeling is set to hit theaters on November 7th 2008.
source: Hollywood Reporter
October 16th, 2007 at 12:40 am
He may have a “great” track record, but lately he also has a boring one, and the Changeling doesn’t sound much better. I’d love to see the payoff from Eastwood taking an actual risk in his choice of projects.
October 16th, 2007 at 2:06 am
…okay, now read the second paragraph sloooowwwwwly….boy is not hers…serial killer…takes down mayor……..you forgot to add “and in doing so saves the world” and “most controversial movie of the year”
October 17th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
‘He may have a “great” track record, but lately he also has a boring one, and the Changeling doesn’t sound much better. I’d love to see the payoff from Eastwood taking an actual risk in his choice of projects.’
You poor, bitter little Scorsese fanboy.
February 9th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
I think Marty’s October comments about Mr. Eastwood’s latest films being boring, and that he would like to see Clint take “an actual risk in his choice of projects” are rather unfair and off the mark. If he means that Eastwood’s films are boring because, by today’s standards, they don’t have enough explosions, dramatic car chases and crashes to satisfy the teen-aged audience, then I suppose he might have a bit of a point. But Mr. Eastwood likes to tell stories that reflect what happens most often in the real world with characters and their situations that most of us more experienced folks can relate to.
Would you say that “Million Dollar Baby” (Best Picture Oscar Winner), or “Mystic River” (Best Picture Oscar nominee) were boring? They dramatized in superb fashion the struggles that millions of people contend with day in and day out, and they didn’t require overdone digital distractions to boost interest in the stories they told.
As for Marty’s comment that Mr. Eastwood avoids taking “an actual risk in his choice of projects, I would say this: Eastwood took a huge gamble making “Flags of our Fathers” (a good film) and “Letters from Iwo Jima” (a Golden Globe Best Picture winner) simultaneously — a hurculean effort by most filmmaking standards. As I understand it, others including those who owned the script to “Flags” didn’t quite know how to transform the complicated story to the screen and Clint stepped in to accept the challenge. That’s taking a risk, don’t you think? And a rather large one?
At any rate, I am looking forward to “The Changeling” as yet another contribution to Eastwood’s “great track record,” as Marty puts it. But Marty probably will find it boring if he expects it to include car chases and crashes among 1928 Model T’s. Or are they A’s?