To Miss G, With Love
PopcornReel.com Film Review: "Freedom
Writers"
By Omar P.L. Moore/January 5, 2007
Long Beach, California, mid-1990's.
The Rodney King related-escalations are at their height.
Hilary Swank (right of center here) as Erin Gruwell, with her students, in "Freedom Writers".
(Photos by Jaimie Trueblood/Paramount Pictures)
Erin Gruwell, a wide-eyed cheery idealist, came to Woodrow Wilson High School in the mid-1990's to teach kids whose desire to learn was desire to learn was matched only by the desire to put a hole in their own heads. Violence, gang membership, broken homes, inequities, poverty and callous indifference hampered their growth as competent individuals. In short, the students were going through the motions and in some senses, so was Ms. Gruwell.
This is not just another story about a white teacher who comes into a Black, Latino and Asian-populated school to change the attitudes of her students.
It is a true story.
Richard LaGravenese directs "Freedom Writers", which opens in North America today and is released by Paramount Pictures. The film is written by the director who adapted his screenplay from the book "The Freedom Writers Diary" by the Freedom Writers with Erin Gruwell. Hilary Swank portrays Gruwell, and she brings something more than a nice smile and assured manner to the film. She changes the rules and the kids change her. Gruwell earnestly wants to know about these students backgrounds and despite the stony resistance she faces, transforms them into people who not only start to care about themselves, but also the world around them beyond where they live.
"Freedom Writers" sets the tone of the mid-1990's with such musical hip-hop and rap music flavoring as Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It" and Naughty By Nature's "Hip-Hop Hooray". Gruwell teaches freshmen and sophomore classes and predictably at the start is in over her head. Turf, blood, ethnic pride and gang "set" are all that matters in their world. One student Ava (terrific acting from April Lee Hernandez) narrates in a voice-over what the realities of life are like on the streets of Long Beach. Ava has seen her dad framed by the Los Angeles Police, seen countless deaths of friends, and constantly runs from trouble. In one honest moment, she hates the likes of Ms. Gruwell and her "kind", and tells her forthrightly about it.
There are other students in the class who have known the heartbreak of loss. The students battle each other like warring countries (and an analogy that Gruwell makes about this subject is particularly powerful.) Ms. Gruwell also encounters resistance at school from the all-white faculty at Wilson, headed by Margaret Campbell (a solid performance from Imelda Staunton) and the blatantly racist sentiments of Brian Gelford (John Benjamin Hickey) who teaches an honors class and asks its lone black representative for the "black
perspective" on a subject. If that isn't enough, Gruwell also faces lots of questions at home from husband Scott (Patrick Dempsey), who is concerned that he is losing her to the kids that she is transforming with such notable works as "The Diary Of Anne Frank". The truth is that Scott's confidence in his own aspirations are low, if not lower, than the standards of the students his wife teaches.
"Freedom Writers" has some of the cliches of past films of its genre but also possesses plenty of things of its own, such as a grounding and substance that sets it apart from other films -- presumably the way the real-life Ms. Gruwell set herself apart from other teachers in Woodrow Wilson High: by caring about the lives of those she teaches.
The very few complaints of Mr. LaGravenese's film -- which admirably tackles Erin's fears and marital turmoil, the guiding hand and encouragement of Erin's father (Scott Glenn), along with the lives and inner struggles of the students -- are that more perhaps should have been shown of the students' perspectives. And if Ava and co. have forgotten what started the wars on the streets of Long Beach, are tormented by their unsteady existence in a harsh society and feel low self-esteem, then why not introduce them to books like Maya Angelou's "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings", or Ruben "Hurricane" Carter's "The 16th Round", or "The Autobiography Of Malcolm X", or the poems of Sonia Sanchez, or James Baldwin's "The Fire Next Time", or Ben Carson's "Gifted Hands"? (Or these days, since Gruwell continues to teach and transform -- how about Chris Gardner's "The Pursuit Of Happyness"?) Surely these books and others would inspire the students and give them more readily identifiable heroes, she-roes, people they could relate to?
"The Diary Of Anne Frank" however, does have the common theme that the students can relate to: survival and danger under adverse circumstances. And the effects of the book on the students in Gruwell's class is profound, as is two-time Academy Award winner Hilary Swank's touching and earnest performance.
One of four new film releases to kick off the 2007 film year in North America, "Freedom Writers" gets the write right. Thought-provoking, it has full-blooded emotion, power, poignancy and heart.
Student and teacher: Hilary Swank on set, with the real-life Erin Gruwell.
"Freedom Writers" is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America for violent content, some thematic material, and language. The film's duration is two hours and three minutes. The film was executive produced by Hilary Swank, among others, with Danny DeVito, Michael Shamberg and Stacy Sher producing.
[Logo at the top of this page: Copyright 2007. Paramount Pictures.]
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