Frequency: Freaky but Cool

Rated PG-13

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I have a short list of actors who I’d pay good money to see read out of the phone book — Stephen Dorff, Matthew McConaughey in the thickest Texan accent he can muster, Ben Affleck. And Jude Law, but he’s gotta be nekkid.

Last year, I added a new guy to the list — Jim Caviezel. If you have no idea who this guy is, he appeared in The Thin Red Line. Yeah, you still don’t know he is. Understandable — I think some little old lady in Iowa and me were the only ones who saw it. Man, Jim’s good-looking. I mean, really good-looking. Looking at a picture of him makes me want to curl up in his lap and purr like a kitten. Embarrassing, but true.

Anyway, Jim stars in Frequency, the story of a cop, John Sullivan (Jim), who uses his father’s old ham radio to contact his firefighter father Frank in 1969 to keep Frank from dying that year. Dennis Quaid plays the father, who looks nothing like Jim, but I don’t think I could have handled two of him in one movie.

By saving his father, John ends up getting his mother murdered. Father and son must work together to stop the guy. The movie moves between 1969 and 1999, where everything that John and Frank change makes things happen in the future. John saves his father and becomes the only one who remembers his father died in a warehouse fire. Frank burns a greeting in a desk, and as he does it, John watches the words appear on the desk in the future. Freaky but cool, this entire movie is a blast.

OK, now that I’m done with the review part of the review, I’ve just got to say something. Why is it that every time a bunch of movie critics make a big deal about a miniscule “mistake” in a movie, I figure out that they’re nuts? Take Titanic. All I heard for months was how anyone with any sense would not have given up luxury for an overcoat and a necklace you couldn’t sell, like Rose did. Hello? Did anyone else watch that movie? Right before Cal took the necklace out of the safe, he stuffed stacks of money in his overcoat pockets. With the amount of money Rose probably had, she could have lived like Tori Spelling.

So why am I blabbering about this? Because all I’ve been hearing about this movie is how it’s good, but there’s this big, glaring mistake that John and Frank can use the radio from across the room without pushing the button. Uh, you professional movie critic types? You did see the part when the two first start talking to each other, and they both play with the button, and the mikes still work, right? Right?

Oh, never mind. I’m going off to stare at a picture of Jim Caviezel and drool.

Jennifer Matarese