Frequency

Frequency is the appealing new movie that looks at the consequences of changing the past. It is a familiar story, especially to fans of The Terminator, Star Trek, 12 Monkeys, Mark Waid's stories in The Flash, and countless other science fiction movies, comic books, and television shows. There are so many of these movies because the possibilities for telling fascinating stories are nearly unlimited. Here, Toby Emmerich scripts another exciting tale of the past changing the future. This time, the story switches between 1960 and 1999.

At the beginning of the movie, fireman Frank Sullivan (Dennis Quaid, Any Given Sunday, Savior) is speaking on his ham radio. Frank is a loving husband and caring father to his son John. Exactly thirty years later, his son John (Jim Caviezel, Ride With The Devil, The Thin Red Line) is a policeman and lives in the same house. Because of some strange interference with the aurora borealis, John is able to hear Frank's voice through the radio. To John, this is amazing, because a fire claimed the life of his father when he was a young boy. John warns Frank about the fire, and this time, Frank survives and John's mind floods with new memories of his father growing up. However, now that things are different, other things begin to change. Previously, John's wife Julia (Elizabeth Mitchell, Gia, Nurse Betty) survived to the present day, now, she does not. She becomes a victim of a serial murderer who John investigated in the present. Not only is Julia now dead, the body count is higher, and no one but John realizes this. John and Frank slowly try to stop and solve the murders, with John in the present guiding Frank in the past. In the past, John must try his hand with police work, something he is completely unfamiliar with, and in the future, John must deal with a case that continually changes.

It's an ambitious story that stretches thin near the end, but it still works because most of the plot twists are fairly plausible. Not only is it fun to watch, but Quaid and Caviezel also provide much thick emotion, as a father and son getting to know each other for the first time. They have excellent chemistry together bonding, an especially difficult task since the two are essentially never in the same scene together. In fact, there is so much emotion in Frequency that it will probably leave many men teary-eyed. Credit this to director Gregory Holbit (Primal Fear, Fallen), who keeps the story moving quickly without confusing viewers. Holbit also adds small touches (a broken glass, a burn on the table, a radio broadcast at the beginning of the movie) to cement the bond between the past and the present.

Haro Rates It: Pretty Good.
2 hours, 1 minute, Rated PG-13 for intense violence and disturbing images.

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