FREEDOMLAND — ** — Samuel L. Jackson, Julianne Moore, Edie Falco; rated R (profanity, violence, drugs, racial epithets, brief gore, vulgarity).

At this point, the jury's still out on the question of whether Joe Roth is more inept at being a studio chief or a director of movies.

As the head of Revolution Pictures, Roth has produced such cinematic atrocities as "Daddy Day Care," "Gigli" and the "xXx" movies. On the other hand, as director, he's been responsible for such duds as "Christmas With the Kranks," "America's Sweethearts" and, now, "Freedomland."

This lackluster thriller adapts Richard Price's best-selling novel, which deals with issues of missing children and racial tensions between neighborhoods and police agencies. But Roth's ham-fisted approach here suggests that he is trying to stage his own version of Clint Eastwood's overrated, Oscar-nominated "Mystic River."

He also wastes the talents of a good cast, led by Samuel L. Jackson, who stars as Lorenzo Council, a well-respected New Jersey detective who has been serving as an unofficial liaison between his department and residents of a troubled housing project.

Tensions between police and the mostly black residents of the project only worsen when Brenda Martin (Julianne Moore) appears, bloodied and in shock, in a local emergency room. She claims to have been carjacked by a black man and then reveals that her 4-year-son was inside the car when the crime occurred.

Further complicating matters is the fact that Brenda's brother Danny (Ron Eldard) is also a police officer. So while the project is on lock-down, it's up to Lorenzo to either find the boy or find out what really happened before a race riot occurs.

Jackson brings the needed intensity to his role, and Edie Falco is terrific as a woman who runs a missing-children organization. But Moore gives her worst performance in quite some time as she struggles with an unconvincing New Joisey accent.

Of course, she is reading from a bad script, courtesy of Price himself, whose dialogue sounds more like "speechifying" than actual conversations.

"Freedomland" is rated R for frequent use of strong profanity, a few scenes of violence (including some rioting and police brutality), some drug content (including brief marijuana use and references to crack cocaine), some brief gore, and use of a few racial epithets and vulgar slang terms. Running time: 113 minutes.

---

E-mail: jeff@desnews.com