I had originally seen Frequency in theaters with my little sisters friends (babysitting). I had wanted to see the film and talked my sister into going to see it too so I could watch. Now, my sister is 13 and at that age where all you want to do is smack her upside her head with an iron, but she behaved pretty well and, get this, her and her friends liked the movie.

Now there are two ways you can enjoy this movie: One- As a Sci-Fi fan, or Two - As just a movie watcher.

For those of you who are hardcore sci-fi, you will be disappointed with this movie because of the plot holes in its time travel premise, but despite that the core of the story remains free of holes, and that core is the relationship between a father and his son.

The story begins with some action when we meet Frank Sullivan, a firefighter with a daredevil streak who still manages to make it home to his wife and young son, John. One day though Frank’s luck runs out and he dies in a warehouse fire when John is only six. Now fast forward thirty years and we meet a haggard New York City police detective, John Sullivan, all grown up. John’s life is in shambles. He’s just broken up with his live in girlfriend and nurses his wounds with the nearest bottle of liquor. He still lives in his old home from when he was a kid while his elderly mother lives on her own in an apartment in the city. He also still lives next door to his best pal, Gordo who keeps on talking about internet stocks and how one day his ship will come in. Gordo already has a family of his own and is far better off in life in comparison to John. One night though, Gordo’s son finds an old box in John’s house that contains Frank Sullivan’s old HAM radio. Just for kicks the guys put the thing together and see who they can talk to.

At the same time a rare celestial event takes place in the skies over New York. The Aurora Borealis is gracing the lower hemisphere with its presence as well as an unexpected bonus. While John is trying to communicate over the HAM he gets a response from a man named Frank. They chat for a little while, nothing special just to men talking about the ‘Amazon’ Mets’. The next night though, things get weird when he hears Frank call his son, ‘chief’ over the radio. ‘Chief’ is the nickname his father had for John when he was a little boy so John, obviously curious, asks Frank what his address is. When their addresses are the same, Frank goes into shock hearing what obviously cannot be true. But the two men manage to move past this and take advantage of what is truly a miracle. John also takes the chance to warn his father of his imminent death in the factory fire. The information John gives him saves Frank’s life but at an unexpected price; the life of his mother. Frank is not alive in 1999, he dies of lung cancer in the eighties. During the same time in 1969 a serial killer by the name of the “Nightingale Rapist” is on the loose and his case has remained unsolved for thirty years. An unexpected side effect of Frank Sullivan being saved from his own death results in the death of his mother at the hands of the killer.

At this point the movie veers off in the direction of a thriller with father and son setting out to try and catch the killer and preventing the death of Mrs. Sullivan in the past. With a lesser director this segue of genres could have come off hokey and pretty stupid, but Gregory Hoblit manages to maintain some sincerity in the movie and keeps what would normally send a film crashing to its knees, afloat with suspense and concern for the characters.

The sci-fi element of the film also helps keep the audience glued to the screen with intriguing views on time travel and the space time continuum . But the characters don’t try and figure these mysteries out, they don’t analyze the historic precedent that is taking place before them, John and Frank simply take it as a chance to fix things that went wrong and then fix the things that occurred after their dabblings in what is surely something greater than the both of them. Although there are extremely interesting holes left wide open in the time travel category of the film, it still doesn’t take away from what is truly at the core of Frequency, the healthy, honest and loving relationship between a father and son which is hardly shown in film anymore.

Jim Caviezel, straight out of his esoteric and mesmerizing role as Pvt. Witt in The Thin Red line, plays the part of the haggard, adult John Sullivan adequately enough, sporting an almost comical New York accent. Dennis Quaid is also pleasing as Frank Sullivan, showing some of his better work in years. The two men hardly have any scenes together but show chemistry anyway in their heartfelt conversations, despite this. I felt the ending was a bit soft, but still right. People clapped at the end when I saw it in the theater, and I have to say I almost did too. It was a grand piece of sci-fi like 2001: A Space Odyssey, but it was touching and suspenseful enough to garner my respect and my recommendation for you to watch it.






Recommended: Yes