An exceptional cast of three Oscar nominees, with some wins between them, work hard to elevate a plodding script to more than a TV movie of the week, but it's a tough ask.
Freeheld struggles on many levels, which is a shame as it's a worthy and moving story, adapted for the screen by Ron Nyswaner (Philadelphia), about a New Jersey detective with terminal cancer, who in 2005 fought to have her pension passed to her same-sex partner.
Director Peter Sollett is heavy on obvious visual cues, including Moore's distracting Farrah Fawcett hairdo, as the scene is set as a crime drama, following Laurel Hester (Moore) and partner Dane Wells (Shannon) as they work a case to bring down a local drug ring. We learn Hester (the subject of a 2007 Oscar-winning documentary, also called Freeheld) is an intensely private woman who keeps her sexual orientation a secret - it's hard enough being a woman on the force, let alone a lesbian.
Freeheld switches into romantic drama mode when Laurel meets Stacie Andree (Page) and they begin dating, and move in together. Pretty quickly we move into disease of the week territory, when Laurel is diagnosed with cancer. As you'd expect from an actress who won an Oscar for her exceptional portrayal of a woman suffering from Alzheimer's, Moore is excellent. Unfortunately Page isn't given much to work with beyond being the distraught partner, and a lack of chemistry means though we're shown the complexity of their relationship there is little emotion to underpin it.
The story gets more clunky as Laurel and Stacie are pushed aside and Dane takes over as the quiet hero prepared to be ostracised by his colleagues in order to see justice done for his old friend. He brings some poignancy to events, unlike Steve Carell who comes barging in as a loud, gay Jewish activist - who may or may not have been giving a comedy routine.
