Gordon Family Tree

What was meant as a warm, milk and cookies, "feel good" movie with an ever so light rap on the career knuckles about loving what you do and doing what you love, comes across as an exercise in Moviemaking 101, with maybe a grade of C? The conflict: self vs self, family propagated ambitious career vs being myself and, building tree houses....FREE. (Protagonist's first name is Freemont...ewww...how destiny tips us, huh? The selfish director laid the music on top of scenes without so much as a thought that the lyrics in the song might intrude on viewer's intelligible hearing of character dialogue. And with such a vast world musical library to choose from, he goes with unprofessional, self-written (and hummed and strummed on the guitar?) numbers. Music also doesn't match the scene mood, so ironically creates disharmony where harmony was needed. The acting was plain jane as I got caught up in the trim job of his beard, and the love interest's harsh voice. Scene cuts, interfacing were rough, poorly timed, and editing just didn't create the seamless united effect of a single, artistic work. Within the first 8 minutes of the film, which is supposed to "hook" the audience, the quick cuts and lesser characters' purpose was an amalgam of contrary images. There was consistency once he was given a new Chevy and drove east from California to find....a biopic of the parents good deeds! So why wasn't this film just turned into a biography because it doesn't have a single unifying purpose through its didactic chowder. No.

Gordon Family Tree is a warm-hearted story about a single man who comes from the Gordon family, where each member is a person of influence or celebrity; whereas he is working in an architectural firm instead of following his dream. Follow Freemont Gordon as he travels far from home leaving his own mark on lives he touches while interaction with others restores his belief in himself. This film may feel slow at times, but it's paced that way intentionally so that you can feel what Freemont feels and experience his awakening in the same way he does. I highly recommend this film!!!! Totally appropriate for the whole family. We need more wholesome films like this.

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OK, but not great. The first 35 minutes I was so wanting to turn it off. I really, wanted to like this movie, but it's a 3. The story was good enough but it wasn't treated well in this movie. The actors are ok, sadly just ok. I lot of over acting especially by the balloon delivery girl, she did not need to be in this movie. It's an ok movie, but you can find something that had more effort put into it for sure.

I really enjoyed this 'family' movie! Great message, great acting....a very good movie for your family. A young man working in a professional field, constantly reminded that the rest of his family is extremely successful....twin sister=successful film star, older brother=professional baseball player, father=very successful writer. He is a very talented man, but not in similar ways as the rest of his family...enjoy the story as he finds what he truly enjoys doing!

Amazon reviewers, please don't do this to me again. My wife and I lasted about 30 minutes. First and foremost what ruined this movie for us was the sound editing. Not only was the sound "off" for this movie (music too loud, character voices tone and volume levels were all different), but the editing person felt the need to play the same piano riffs through EVERY scene. Hint to sound editor: you don't need to play music for the entire movie. It also didn't need to take the first 30 minutes to tell the part of the story about him not being happy in his job. Slooooow. No chemistry at with the girl to this point in the movie. Sorry if this comes off mean, but it drove me crazy.

I liked it and do think that it is worth watching but I think a better job could have been done with the production and editing: it was not as impactful as it should have been Having said that, the actors were very good and the story is one that keeps you watching.

I enjoyed this movie. It was certainly not a fast moving, action packed film, but a quiet one with a lot of reflection. It was about capturing those transitional times in life that we all seem to go through, only Free's turns out better than most.