Frequency

'Frequency's quality is all but'

You know, Dennis Quaid has just never been an appealing lead man for me. He's never BAD, but he just looks perfect for the perfect husband role or occassionally the good-hearted Grizzly Adams type. Has he ever played a villain?! Which is probably why it shocked me so much to see Frequency, not because he is a villain, but because he pulls off badass and the daring risk taker type so well with a decent New York accent. Then again, he is the protective loving father type...so, there.

The movie is directed by Gregory Hoblit from a script by Toby Emmerich. It is about a boy whose father is a daring firefighter whom grows up to find out that his old AM radio can communicate with his father from 30 years ago when the Aurora Borealis (a phenomenon!) appears overhead...yea, its a lame setup. In fact, most of the science in the movie is poorly explained, but then again Hollywood is notorious for not paying any attention to flaws in scripts when it comes to movies dealing with time. So, the son tries to convince his dad of certain things, saves his dad from a deadly fire and changes the future. Then, because the dad was safe, a murderer known as the Nightingale murderer continues to kill people, including the son's mom so the dad and older son team up to stop the killer before it happens. The one thing I will say about the writing for the script is that Toby Emmerich has a good ear for dialogue and accent, knows how to write a gripping story and obviously LOVES baseball. He is also has a good sense of family and community as the whole reconciling son with still living father thing is well done. But like I said, this guy sucks at science fiction. The story even contradicts itself in several places hoping that you won't notice by skipping on ahead to it's predicted cheesier father-son moments. With that said, as long as Emmerich stays away from sci-fi pretexts, especially time, he should be okay. At least this movie understood that if you change the future every one in the present will change too and not remember the previous timeline...although apparently the son does for some UNEXPLAINED REASON.

As for the acting, well, Quaid really surprised me and I bet he is a much better actor than people give him credit for. If only he'd take some riskier parts occassionally, although he is definately the perfect dad. Then there is his son, played by "Jesus" Jim Caviezel in one of his earlier roles. He kind of mopes through out the whole movie and his love life is screwed quickly with very little attention to it. But at least he gets the bereaved son turned cop glad to save his father bit down. The bad guy played by Shawn Doyle is just plain crazy. I can't give too much away, but man this guy is good at playing a stone cold killer when he has to. Lastly, I want to give a shout out to my main man Andre Braugher who plays Satch. I loved watching you on Homicide man, you are the coolest police officer out there and obviously a talented actor. If I make a film, I'll come find you and pull a Tarantino on your ass. The acting is pretty good for the most part and you will be so surprised by Quaid's ability to be a firefighter that you probably won't notice the lack of personality change in Caviezel. Now just think, several years down the road from this Caviezel will play the bad guy in another pseudo okay time movie called Deja Vu...hmmmm.

I have to give props to the director for what is obviously a flawed and probably exasperating script to work with and making a decent popcorn flick out of it. It's true, you might like slow motion dropping objects a bit much but all is forgiven in having a cast that can do the part well and in doing a great job of differentiating the timelines for the characters and in the process of updating memories and adding furniture after a big event happens. Although I'm still confused if time changed or if the two timelines are funning parallel to each other because it seems as if Caviezel and Quaid are running on the same time schedule. You were smart though and made the movie about the struggle of a son to save his father and put a lot of time on their interactions to make us care about the characters and their funny accents. I congratulate you on that and I hope that all future endeavors have a better thought out script for you to make magic with. Good job.

Conclusion:
The script has a lot of pros but it's cons are highly noticeable and can throw you out of the mood and the believability of the story. Thankfully Quaid does a great job and shines as does the rest of the cast and the directing is so top notch that it is quickly forgiven in order to follow the gripping turns and hope that all will end A-OKAY. Nowhere near brilliant or amazing, but definately good to be studid by all directors out there with cruddy scripts wondering how to make a GOOD movie out of it. Give it a shot some time if you are weak stomached and want a good gripping tale. Otherwise, see it for Jesus...:)

3.3 out of 5

Wannabe