FREEHELD
Summit Entertainment
Reviewed by: Harvey Karten for Shockya. Databased on Rotten Tomatoes.
Grade: B+
Director: Peter Sollett
Written by: Ron Nyswaner based on Cynthia Wade’s documentary
Cast: Julianne Moore, Ellen Page, Michael Shannon, Steve Carell, Josh Charles
Screened at: Dolby88, NYC, 9/24/15
Opens: October 2, 2015
They say that the reason more than half the country is now sympathetic to gay marriage is that we Americans know people among our own families and friends who are homosexual or lesbian, and hey, they’re real human beings! It’s a small step from that insight to the belief that in certain areas people should have equality—maybe not in income, but surely in love. Further, why should local governments allow the transfer of pensions to spouses of employees who have died, but determine to shut out domestic partners? Such is the case with Peter Sollett’s film, “Freeheld,” a rousing, even exhilarating film that will likely be cheered by audiences of straight and gays alike, while recognizing that not everyone will be wholly sympathetic to the politics therein. Still, as Victor Hugo said, “There is no force so powerful as an idea whose time has come.”
“Freeheld,” which boasts that it is a true story, one that follows up Cynthia Wade’s forty-minutes’ long documentary of the same name using the same names of characters, deals with an issue of money, at least on the surface. On a deeper level it can be construed as an allegory that embraces our Fourteenth Amendment, which commands each state to provide equal protection under the law to all residents. In Ocean County, New Jersey, the five-member board of freeholders recognizes that its constituents are conservative, making the governing group fearful of breaking tradition. As they believe a majority of citizens therein are not too excited about domestic partnership, wherein two people of the same sex can take out a certificate that they are legally bonded although not married (marriage by two people of the same gender was illegal at the time of this true story), they are unwilling to vote to allow one partner to allow his her significant other to be granted a pension right after death. New Jersey legislation gives the board of freeholders the power to re-negotiate, that is to vote to allow country police officers, for example, to transfer their pensions to their partners upon the death of the officers. When the freeholders forbid a dying Laurel Hester (Julianne Moore), a highly accomplished detective (we see her busting a group of drug lords) to have her pension continue to her domestic partner Stacie Andree (Ellen Page), the stage is set for high political drama.
After showing us in the audience what a fine detective Laurel is, we see that Stacie has her own expertise. When the short woman with a neat, boyish haircut, applies for a job as an auto mechanic, she beats the garage record of a complete tire rotation in eight minutes by undercutting her competitor by several seconds. Stacie is brash enough to go after what she wants, particularly when she approaches Laurel, whose team had competed with Stacie’s in volleyball, to ask for her phone number. This may look like an odd couple with perhaps a twenty-year age difference and a foot in height, but when it comes to love, the heart knows what the brain lacks. When Laurel is diagnosed with Stage Four lung cancer with only a ten percent chance of survival, she grows steadily weaker, eventually losing all her hair, but she is determined not to allow her pension to drift back to the county rather than have it transferred to Stacie, in order to allow Stacie to continue living in their house.
The local matter, one which has already resulted in two unanimous votes of the freeholders to continue denying pension rights to domestic partners, brings on a rally from a Garden State community of activists itching to fight the local government under the leadership of a kippah-wearing gay Jew, Steven Goldstein (Steve Carell). While Goldstein and his group pressure the town governors, Dane Wells (Michael Shannon), Hester’s police partner, tries to rally his department to come up publicly in support of the fight for equality.
Despite a by-the-numbers film, director Sollett, graced with a superb performance by Ellen Page and Julianne Moore and by an alternately humorous and demanding performance from Steve Carell, will manage to evoke a crowd-pleasing reaction from perhaps most of the folks who will attend the film and, who knows? Maybe some of stodgy people who resist Victor Hugo’s viewpoint will become converts to the cause of progressive politics!
Rated PG-13. 103 minutes. © Harvey Karten, Member, New York Film Critics Online
Story – B
Acting – A-
Technical – B+
Overall – B+
