Changeling is painful to watch. It tears at your gut. It's violent. It observes some of the ugliest behavior mankind can conceive. And ...
"It's all a true story," scriptwriter J. Michael Straczynski told Time magazine. "Every bit of it. We wanted to go from 'Based on a True Story' to 'A True Story' in the credits. To do that, I had to work with Universal Studio's legal department and go through every single scene and provide attribution."
Director Clint Eastwood actually leaves some of the story's most horrific parts outside the frame. The real Gordon Northcott sexually assaulted his accomplice and raped his victims before killing them—abuse only hinted at on the screen. "I tried to show the brutalizing in a way that wasn't as brutal as it really was," Eastwood told the Los Angeles Times.
He also takes great pains to highlight a mother's dedication to her child and a minister's quest to clean up his town.
But Eastwood's restraint is relative: Changeling still revolves around a psychopath who kidnaps and hacks up little boys in a chicken coop. We don't see the full scope of these children's pain. But we see enough. More than enough.
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I’ve seen the movie and it is powerful and heartbraking.