Freeheld (2015) (English Language)

Review

101min

Genre:      Fact-based, Drama, Romance

Director:   Peter Sollett

Cast:        Julianne Moore, Ellen Page, Michael Shannon…and more

Writer:     Ron Nyswaner

-Synopsis-

American equal rights drama based on a true story and starring Oscar-winner Julianne Moore as Laurel Hester, a decorated New Jersey police Detective diagnosed with terminal lung cancer who took on the local government after they denied a request to transfer her pension benefits to her lesbian partner, a privilege afforded to heterosexual spouses or those in “traditional” marriages.

Before director Peter Sollett ever captured a single frame, ‘Freeheld’ already had many things going for it.

A true heartfelt and bittersweet American story about real everyday people in a fight-for-justice narrative and civil rights case with wide-reaching implications for a divided country, a cast of accomplished revered actors, and Oscar-winning source material in the form of 2007’s Best Short Film Documentary of the same name, on which this film is based.

Armed with these ingredients and good intentions, producers have commendably tried to cook up a dramatic version of a contemporary 21st century civil rights story for a wider audience, but despite being an independent production, ‘Freeheld’ falls into the same narrative traps as many an underwhelming Hollywood drama.

‘Freeheld’ is essentially an unconventional tragic love story about two women who unwittingly become a focal point for gay rights and marriage equality in America, but the overly familiar and uncompelling execution is littered with clichés and a prescriptive narrative.

Ultimately this feels like a Hallmark channel TV Movie melodrama with one-dimensional characters, particularly disappointing given a cast that not only includes Julianne Moore and Ellen Page in the central roles, but also Michael Shannon and Steve Carell among other accomplished actors.

For all its shortcomings as a drama, ‘Freeheld’ does manage to successfully frame the “gay marriage” theme as an equality and civil rights issue which is traditionally afforded to only certain citizens.

Any moral tradition-based objections some may have will ultimately be irrelevant in a secular nation with an established separation of church and state, society seems no longer willing to allow discrimination based on sexuality or anything else, for people who fight for equal rights the moral justice argument is the carrot, but the law of the land and the constitution will always be the stick.

The Bottom Line…

A strong cast and contemporary socially relevant source material can’t prevent this from being a predictably executed drama with a pedestrian narrative, ‘Freeheld’ just about manages to bring a real personal struggle with broad implications to a wider audience, but could have done much more.

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Similar films you may like (Home Video)

Milk (2008)

Oscar-winning drama based on the extraordinary and ultimately tragic true story of Harvey Milk, a gay rights activist in 1970s San Francisco who became the first openly Gay person to be elected to public office in the state.

Directed by Gus Van Sant and starring  Sean Penn, Josh Brolin and Emile Hirsch among others.

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