Angelina Jolie stars in this drama, based on a true story and set during the late 1920s in Los Angeles. When Christine Collin’s son, Walter, goes missing the LAPD set up a search for the boy. Five months later, the police get a call about a boy with a similar description in Illinois. 

Never mind that Christine, the boy’s mother, doesn’t recognize the child the police find, the LAPD chief insists they have found Walter. Christine stirs up controversy with a local priest and radio broadcaster as she continues to hound the police about her missing son. The chief “escorts” Christine into a physic ward to shut her up, where she meets other women who were also locked up under “Code 12” — by police order. The corrupt LAPD used the ward as a way to punish and silence women who were exposing embarrassing police action.   

Jolie’s acting is heartfelt and powerful. Her classic look fits the 1920s look, and her frail figure and haunting eyes foot the bill of a tortured mother fighting for her son. And the subplot is equally as compelling — a Canadian man and his nephew sneak into the country and pick up random children, take them back to a farm and hide them away in a chicken coop before murdering them with an axe and burying them in a field. The pair murder more than 20 children, and the trial against the sociopath and against the LAPD for its mistreat of Christine take place at the same time. 

Warning: you will cry. It doesn’t sound like a tear-jerker, but you will. 

Contact Kelsey at [email protected].