Frequency Review
by Jon Popick (jpopick AT sick-boy DOT com)April 19th, 2000
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>From its trailer, Frequency doesn’t seem like much of a picture. The story is about a thirty-something cop that is somehow able to contact his dead father through an old HAM radio. The trailer portrays this event with what seems like casual indifference – like the guy just got an AOL instant message from the kid that he sat next to in the seventh grade. The dialogue goes something like this:
Dad – “Hey, Son. It’s me, your dead father.”
Son – “Wow. I can’t believe this.”
Dad – “Yup. Must be some big sun spot or something.”
Son (looking at his watch) – “Yeah. Hey, Dad? This has been great, but Millionaire is coming on right now, so I’ve gotta run.”
Dad – “Alright. Catch ya later, Son. Oh, and remember to choke up on that bat.”
Son – “Whatever, dude. I’m, like, all older now and stuff.”
The trailer then shows the father and son fighting crime and solving murders from thirty years ago, but every time they do something, it alters the future in ways that they can’t anticipate. Kind of like that “Treehouse of Horror” episode of The Simpsons where Homer turns a toaster into a time machine, repeatedly goes back in time and changes his future.
But here’s the thing – even though Frequency is predictable, it’s still creepy as hell. Why? Look no further than director Gregory Hoblit, who has quietly made two of the most unnerving films of the ‘90s in Primal Fear and Fallen. It’s hair-tingling and spine-raising and all of that stuff. Even the way Hoblit and cinematographer Alar Kivilo (A Simple Plan) shoot normal interiors and exteriors is eerie. But the whole altering-the-future-by-changing-the-past plot has been done already, and first-time scriptwriter Toby Emmerich offers little that we haven’t already seen before.
Frequency begins in 1969 Queens, where the borough is preparing for the upcoming World Series between the Mets and the Baltimore Orioles. Second-generation firefighter Frank Sullivan (Dennis Quaid, Any Given Sunday) is happily married with a young son and a strong friendship with a cop named Satch (André Braugher, Homicide: Life on the Streets). Frank is also a HAM radio geek, but forbids his son from using the contraption, instructing the boy - with a heavy New Yawk accent – that “Dis is not a toy.”
Flash to thirty years later, where Frank’s son John (James Caviezel, Ride With the Devil) is a homicide investigator (partnered with his Satch) living in the home he grew up in. He’s still grieving the loss of his father, who died during a fire in an abandoned seed warehouse when John was just a boy. On the eve of the anniversary of Frank’s demise, John happens to find a box of his dad’s stuff, including his old HAM radio. John plugs it in, starts talking to his dead dad and warns him about the warehouse fire, thus altering the future.
The fire scene is really well done. It’s one of those times where you don’t realize you're holding your breath until the scene is over and you start gasping for air. But then Frequency turns into a murder mystery, where Frank and John work together to catch a serial killer that was able to off more victims because of the way they messed with history. Discovering the identity of the killer isn’t as much of a priority as stopping him because Mrs. Sullivan (Elizabeth Mitchell, Molly) became one of the victims as a result of Frank not meeting his maker in the warehouse fire.
But, of course, nobody in the ‘60s or ‘90s believes Frank or John. The strange relationship between the two is a bit like The Bone Collector, where the paralyzed Denzel Washington investigated crimes and caught a serial killer despite not ever leaving his bed. Here John is Denzel and Frank is his Angelina Jolie. The idea of Frank and John existing in two different layers of time, yet still talking to each other while sitting in the same house, in the same room, at the same desk, is thoroughly intriguing. But if your brain doesn’t hurt too much from trying to keep up with the twists and turns of the past and present, the ending should be pretty easy to call.
Conversely, there are some decent-sized plot holes in Frequency, as well. John would never be allowed to work on a murder investigation involving his own mother. And I know precious little about HAM radios, but I’m pretty sure that you need to press the button down on the microphone when you want to talk. The film also features some of the worst make-up since Mr. Saturday Night. The characters that are supposed to be aged just look stupid, which should make people appreciate the fine job that was done aging Robin Williams and Embeth Davidtz in Bicentennial Man.
In short, Frequency is a must-see for anyone that ever lost their father, contacted him with a HAM radio and then solved mysteries with him.
1:55 - PG-13 for intense violence and disturbing images
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