comment #1

CitizenKanedforChewingGum says ...

I don't think trailers like that are generally made to be watched that many times.

Watchmen? Maybe.

comment #2

Rich S. says ...

"Maybe a dingo ate your bay-bee."

comment #3

HarveyCo says ...

This is true.

There's something about fictional parents getting all uppity about how much they love their lost kids that really rubs me the wrong way.

Albert Brooks' constant whining about it in "Finding Nemo" ruined the movie for me.

And Harold P's endless "I've got to find my son" rants and cries of "Waaaaaalt" during Lost's second season made me despise the sight of his character.

I can't explain it. Meanwhile I get misty just thinking about Liam Neeson desperately trying to get Ben Kingsley off the train in "Schindler's List" and they weren't related at all, so go figure.

comment #4

Howlingman says ...

Not to mention Jolie in 'Beowulf,' huh HarveyCo?

comment #5

Sabina E says ...

Watching a trailer too many times can probably ruin the moment.

I saw Changeling last week and I liked it a lot.

comment #6

D.Z. says ...

It just proves my point about how overrated Jolie is as an actress.

comment #7

aspiringcrackaddict says ...

DZ

is Jolie's performance the problem or Clint Eastwood's Insistence on pandering to his audience "worst fears."

I am sure that what is objectionable about the clip is that we get that she "wants her son back" and the shot (where the camera is place) OVER emphasizes her character's want to such a degree that it becomes CHEAP.

Close up can do many things but one of the ways the are usually used are as a way of underlining a thing of imortance, a moment, an object, a piece of information, you want the audience to remember or carry with them.

In terms of this film; by the time the moment in question happens we understand and can already empathize with her plight.

In cultural terms, having seen many movies that deal with this issue we go to the film already agreeing to empathize with Jolie's character's plight.

So what is bad about the moment is that it is underlining, over emphasizing something we already understand, it is asking something of the audience which they are already doing and therefore the moment becomes overwrought.

Clint Eastwood and his editor nor his DP for that matter understood where their audience are in this moment.

I'm not sure I've ever read a post where you thought about what you were writing before you wrote it.

comment #8

The Winchester says ...

Take Wells' feelings of the trailer, and that's how I felt about the whole movie.

After two and a half hours, I took one thing from that movie and that was apparently the little boy was not Angelina Jolie's. I know this because she feels the need to repeat ad infinitum in every goddamn scene. I loved the Oscar pandering in the end, too, when they're actually listening to an Oscar ceremony. That's just oscarbation that offends me worse than The Soloist trailer. Bullshit movie. (Although it was more than technically proficient).

DZ, I second your emotion.

comment #9

dukedog says ...

That particular moment in the movie is so much more powerful because she is yelling it at the impostor kid. Once you realize later why that kid is there and why he is lying, it just infuriates you even more. I loved this movie, but I understand why the trailer did that to ya. If you haven't seen the movie, you assume she is yelling at the cops and it is just too over the top, Lifetime movieish. If it had been me, I wouldn't have just yelled at that kid, I might have had to shake him a little too. Bernie Mac used to say on his show, "Boy, you need shakin." I think that comes into play here.

comment #10

Craptastic says ...

Not as funny as:

"They stole my milk"

comment #11

p.Vice says ...

It took you 27 times? My friends and I were cracking up the first time we saw it.

comment #12

source188 says ...

"IS THAT MY DAUGHTER IN THERE!?"

comment #13

Joshua Mooney says ...

My wife refuses to see "Changeling" because she's had to hear Jolie yell, "I want my son back!" probably six hundred times in the last month. I was always mildly intrigued by the emphasis I heard ("I want MY son back"), and would have been doubly so if I'd know she was screaming it at the imposter kid. That takes it almost into the realm of a horror flick. But the dummies didn't show that in the trailer, and anyway, it's too little too late for my good lady, so we'll be seeing the Kaufman or the Leigh film tomorrow night. Which is fine with me.

comment #14

bmcintire says ...

"Yeah, well tough ain't enough, girly!"

comment #15

K. Bowen says ...

Which one do you hate more, Jeff.

I. Just. Want. My. Son. Back.

or

I. Want. MY. Son. Back.

comment #16

K. Bowen says ...

The thing about Jolie's performance is that it has two speeds - plain and overwrought. The flatness of the dialogue really exposes her shortcomings. Malkovich takes that stuff and makes something of it. When Jolie reads it, you notice how flat it is.

Which is why if she gets an Oscar, i'll have a cow.

Changeling, by the way, is basically a silent movie.

comment #17

actionman says ...

Seeing the film tomorrow. Looking forward to it.

comment #18

televisiontears says ...

Seeing this a million and one times has deflated any interest I had in catching this in theaters. Whenever I see a TV spot, I crack up. All I can think about is Tom Jane's guest spot on Arrested Development as the method acting star of "Homeless Dad": "I just want my kids back!"

comment #19

The InSneider says ...

I was laughing throughout the first hour of the film. And she says the words "my son" about 200 times over the course of the movie. Gimme a fucking break. The Clint worship has gotta stop. GOT. TO. STOP.

comment #20

actionman says ...

It'll stop when he starts making shit movies. Maybe Changeling is shit (don't know...haven't seen it yet), but the guy has been pumping out one quality film after another these last few years.

Gran Torino is the one I want to be seeing tomorrow, but Changeling will do for now.

comment #21

Herzog says ...

"I want my sunblock!"

comment #22

ScottMendelson says ...

If you recall, the final bit in the trailer for Rendition was Reese Witherspoon, pleading for information on her rendered husband, howling in a high-pitched tone 'I just want to know that he's OOOKKAAAYY!" It was awkward and seemingly Oscar-pandering in the trailer.

But in the movie, the moment that follows afterwards is devastating. The US officials she's talking to completely ignore her and walk away, leaving her alone, silent, and dejected, having utterly failed in every way to help her husband. It's an emotional highlight of the film, so it's ironic that they used the 'big scene' before that as their trailer button, especially as it was so counter-productive.

Trailer cutters should stop ending their trailers with people (women especially) screaming in high-pitched voices in despair. Aside from the Oscar-pandering and Lifetime movie signals it sends out, It's not pleasing to the ears and the obvious misery being displayed on screen makes the film look as unpleasant as possible.

comment #23

The Winchester says ...

I keep having flashbacks to Mel Gibson in Ransom.

comment #24

dukedog says ...

Scott M.: Hit the nail on the head there! I really did like this movie a lot, but the "my son" repeated over and over made me crazy, not the yelling at the kid. He friggin deserved it, which is all I'll say. I don't want to spoil it for anyone. Why couldn't she refer to her kid as "Walter" since that was his name and all? I don't constantly refer to my daughter as "my daughter". Kid's got a name.

comment #25

George Prager says ...

Offscreen whisper: "Mary Reilly."

comment #26

lazarus says ...

The kid in Changeling's name is Walt, too? Oh that is just too good of a coincidence.

Someone needs to make a mashup with this trailer and Perrineau from Lost (as HarveyCo mentioned above).

And I can't believe this website is still up after 2 years, but if you haven't seen it before:

http://www.waaalt.com/

Make sure your sound is on.

comment #27

arturobandini2 says ...

The Winchester: "I keep having flashbacks to Mel Gibson in Ransom."

For me, it's Sally Field in NOT WITHOUT MY DAUGHTER!

comment #28

LexG says ...

Hope it's not too late to the party on this, but re: "my son."

That press conference in the rain has a REALLY stilted Jolie delivery... think it was even used in the trailers, and indeed happens in the movie the same way.

She says something very, very flat like,

"The LAPD said it was my son.
It was not my son."

I don't know, it's just kind of like a bad Bush song where they rhyme the same word in consecutive lyrics or something.

comment #29

ZayTonday says ...

His name is Walt? lolololololol

WAAAAAAAALT

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALT!!

comment #30

free pc games says ...

really great share! thanks a lot

affiliate review
free pc games download