Review: Unexceptional And Uninvolving 'Freeheld' Starring Ellen Page And Julianne Moore

If the Ocean County, New Jersey Board of Chosen Freeholders sounds to you like the most boring villains in the history of cinema (with the possible exception of the Trade Federation blockade in “The Phantom Menace”), you would not be wrong. You'd also be forgiven if a movie's central crisis concerning the inability to transfer earned pension benefits to a domestic partner sounds as compelling as a trip to the DMV. These are some of the insurmountable problems in “Freeheld,” a would-be but not-actually-inspiring movie about a landmark LGBT rights case that loses sight of the flesh and blood people at its heart, gets bogged down in tedious municipal politics and fails to find a way to compellingly dramatize an important story.

A movie about people deeply in love, who are denied basic human rights and who struggle to their dying breath to ensure their struggles are not in vain —that sounds like a compelling story and is the one "Freeheld" wants to tell. But the movie can't...