Watched Clint Eastwood’s Changeling with Angelina Jolie last night.

Brilliant film.  Hauntingly beautiful.

It takes place in 1928 in LA, and Eastwood definitely gave it that old classic film feel with its antique cars, trolley, amazing hats, and sad sad trumpet.

Angelina is amazing.  It had to be the hats and those lips, and those eyes.  You really felt her pain as Christine Collins, a mother whose child goes missing.  The LAPD tell her they’ve found her child five months later, but its the wrong boy.

They then try to convince Christine she’s crazy because the boy says he’s her son.  Despite dental records and the words of teachers also saying its not her boy, Christine is committed to a mental institution.  At the mercy of the police, this movie tears your heart apart slowly and like Christine herself, you’ll cry for justice.

“I want my son.  I want MY son back,” she cries.

It’s hard to believe this really happened.  So, while watching it, don’t forget that finger printing and DNA evidence weren’t around back in the 20s.  I’d certainly hope something like this would never happen today, but there are indeed innocent people in prisons who are only victims of bad fate.

Christine found herself at the mercy of a serial killer who may, or may not, have killed her son.  The killer sent a telegram to her two years after trial on the eve of his execution, but even then couldn’t bring himself to actually admit to her face what he might have done.

Christine watched him hang, but still didn’t find solace until 5 years later when another missing child was found who had also been kidnapped by the killer.  Her son had helped the kid escape.  So, there was hope that maybe her boy escaped too.

The real Christine died, still searching for her son but never finding him.  But just as she said in the film after hearing the kid’s story about how her son helped him escape, “His story gave me something I didn’t have before.  Hope.”

If you have kids, or even if you don’t, see this film!