Chasing Liberty

Chasing Liberty
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Andy Cadiff
Produced by	Broderick Johnson Andrew Kosove David Parfitt
Written by	Derek Guiley David Schneiderman
Starring	Mandy Moore Matthew Goode
Music by	Christian Henson
Cinematography	Ashley Rowe
Editing by	Jon Gregory
Studio	Alcon Entertainment
Distributed by	Warner Bros.
Release date(s)	January 9, 2004 (2004-01-09)
Running time	111 minutes
Language	English
Budget	$23,000,000 USD (est.)
Box office	$12,313,323

Chasing Liberty is a 2004 American romantic comedy film directed by Andy Cadiff, and starring Mandy Moore and Matthew Goode.^[1]

Plot

Anna Foster (Mandy Moore) is the daughter of President James Foster (Mark Harmon) and First Lady Michelle Foster (Caroline Goodall). After Secret Service agents ruin a first date, Anna demands some freedom. At their upcoming trip to Prague, the president agrees to assign only two agents to watch over Anna and Gabrielle La Clare (Beatrice Rosen). Anna's sexy new look, however, causes her father to reconsider. In Prague, the girls attend a concert, where Anna discovers numerous agents in the crowd; apparently her father had broken his promise. Gabrielle helps Anna elude her protectors. Outside the theater, Anna meets Ben Calder (Matthew Goode), and asks him to take her away on his motorbike.

Anna and Ben go to a bar, where Anna proceeds to get drunk. Unknown to Anna, Ben is actually with the Secret Service, and tells agents Alan Weiss (Jeremy Piven) and Cynthia Morales (Annabella Sciorra) where Anna is. The president orders the three agents to have Ben guard Anna without revealing his true identity—giving her the illusion of freedom with a guarantee of safety. Believing she is free of her guards for the first time in years, Anna jumps into the Vltava River naked, mistaking it for the Danube. Ben runs into the water fully clothed and fishes her out. Weiss and Morales buy the camera from someone taking pictures of the skinny-dipping Anna. Anna and Ben climb a rooftop to watch an opera being shown in a plaza, where Anna eventually falls asleep with Ben watching over her. Weiss and Morales observe from a nearby rooftop.

The next morning, Anna calls her parents to avoid getting into further trouble. Knowing she is safe, her father is initially indulgent, and Anna is about to return, but his tone changes when he is shown the nude photos of her nude in the river. The First Lady, however, asks, "What happened to 'let freedom ring?'" Anna is outraged at both her dad's sudden imperious tone and finding out that he traced her call. Anna decides to meet Gabrielle at the Love Parade in Berlin.

Anna and Ben board a train, where they meet Scotty McGruff (Martin Hancock), a flighty romantic obsessed with Six Million Dollar Man stickers and the interconnectivity of the world. He gives them a stack of stickers and tells them to stick them up in random places, and one day when they are unhappy, they will see one and it will make them smile. Anna and Ben learn that they have boarded a Venice-bound train going in the opposite direction from Berlin. When they arrive in Venice, Ben calls the other agents to tell them where they are, but he runs off when Anna disappears. He finds her and McGruff getting new clothes, and the three set off to explore Venice. After McGruff sets off on his own, Anna realizes that he has just stolen her wallet.

Ben is about to tell the cafe they cannot pay when Anna is recognized and races off to avoid being identified as the First Daughter. Ben follows, and they tell a story of marrying, against the wishes of Anna's parents, to get a gondola ride from a kind-hearted gondolier, Eugenio (Joseph Long). Ben kisses Anna during the ride to hide her from the cafe staff's sight. Since they have no place to stay, Eugenio invites them to his house, where they are welcomed by his mother, Maria (Miriam Margolyes). That night, thinking their kiss meant that Ben cared for her, Anna offers herself to him, but Ben rejects her advances. Anna finally gets in the bed alone, while Ben lies on the floor.

The next day, Eugenio drives them to the Austrian border, as Weiss and Morales show up at Maria's house looking for the gondolier with whom Anna and Ben were last seen. Maria tells them that Anna and Ben are married, which is reported to Anna's parents. Upset that Ben rejected her, Anna gets a ride on a truck, leaving Ben to chase her on a borrowed push-bike through the Austria countryside. Anna comes to a bridge, where she meets the Jumping Germans, a bungy group who are preparing to jump from the bridge. McGruff is among them, preparing to jump. Ben arrives just as Anna is being strapped into the harness. He insists on jumping with her. The jump from the bridge, harnessed together in a tight embrace.

Later that evening at the Jumping Germans' camp, Anna and Ben sit by a fire and eat s'mores while keeping McGruff on a tree branch over the river. McGruff says he needed the money to find a mystery girl he has been chasing all over Europe. After one of the Germans, Gus Gus (Adrian Bouchet), asks Anna to share his tent for the night and she refuses, she once again reminds Ben of her attraction to him. After he rebuffs her once more, she walks away declaring that she will share the tent with the German. In a moment of jealous panic, Ben finally admits his feelings for Anna. As Ben's repaired phone rings, he tosses it aside instead of answering, and they spend the night together.

The next day, Anna and Ben make it to the Love Parade in Berlin, and find Gabrielle, who guesses that something has happened to Anna to make her so happy. Anna points out Ben on the payphone and admits she is in love. While Ben is trying to explain his actions on the phone to his fellow agents, Anna comes up behind him and discovers he is a Secret Service agent, and that he has been lying to her all along. Enraged at the apparent betrayal, Anna runs away from him, only to be surrounded and attacked by a group of men who recognize her. After Ben fights them off, he carries her to the helicopter that has come to pick her up. As the helicopter takes off, Ben is left on the ground alone.

Back at the White House, Anna is preparing for college. Her mom asks how her heart is, to which her reply is, "It's a little bit broken." At college, with Weiss and Morales still protecting her, Anna sees a Six Million Dollar Man sticker and smiles in spite of herself, as it reminds her of her European adventure. On her Christmas break, she visits her father who tells her that Ben has resigned from the Secret Service and is now working as a photographer in London. She goes there on an exchange program to Oxford University and visits Ben at an opera, where they kiss and reconcile, with Agent Weiss and his new bald, moustached wearing partner looking on. Anna then asks Ben for his help in escaping once again.

A subplot involving Weiss and Morales (Anna's two secret agents) is also in the story. Weiss makes snide comments about Morales, even once asking her to strip naked. Morales then asks him what kind of women want his "construction-break" attitude. Weiss suddenly treats her coldly after this, until they make up later on. Weiss tells Morales that he has had no girlfriends since his hairline receded. Morales tells him that he should get it cut short because some women like that. Later, Morales sees that Weiss has cut his hair and she says it is sexy. He kisses her. He says sorry and pulls away. He begins to walk away, but she grabs his arm and kisses him back. At college with Anna, we see that their relationship is still going well, with Weiss mentioning that he will need to get a new partner, preferably an "old, fat guy."

Production details

The scenes involving the White House were in fact filmed at Hylands House in Chelmsford, Essex, England, which resembles the White House. Blueprints of the White House were also used to create a digital replica, which helped make it seem real. These blueprints caused the director some trouble when traveling to Washington, D.C., as his suitcase also contained source material about the Oval Office, among other things.

The storyline was directly inspired by Chelsea Clinton, who was photographed trying to blend in with other students at a Stanford basketball game.^[2] The film received a lukewarm response from critics,^[3] but won three Teen Choice Awards.

A similar movie released later that same year, First Daughter, was an equally large commercial loss. An early working title for Chasing Liberty had been Untitled First Daughter Project^[4]

The problem with which Anna Foster is convinced she has to cope, the perceived tendency of Secret Service agents to behave like unwanted, almost anti-sexual chaperones when dealing with the sons and daughters of United States Government officials they are assigned to guard, had previously provided story material for other motion pictures such as the comedy First Family, which starred George Robert "Bob" Newhart as the President of the United States.

Cast

• Mandy Moore as Anna Foster
• Matthew Goode as Special Agent Ben Calder
• Stark Sands as Grant Hillman
• Tony Jayawardena as White House Guard
• Jeremy Piven as Special Agent Alan Weiss
• Annabella Sciorra as Special Agent Cynthia Morales
• Sam Ellis as Phil
• Terence Maynard as Harper
• Mark Harmon as President James Foster
• Lewis Hancock as Press Secretary
• Garrick Hagon as Secretary of State
• Zac Benoir as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
• Jan Goodman as National Security Advisor
• Robert Ashe as Chief of Staff
• Caroline Goodall as First Lady Michelle Foster
• Beatrice Rosen as Gabrielle
• Martin Hancock as McGruff
• The Roots as Themselves

References

1. ^ IMDB "Chasing Liberty". http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0360139/ IMDB. Retrieved 13 November 2011. 
2. ^ C.W. Nevius (2004-01-22). "Just ask Chelsea, Jenna and Barbara: Escaping the glare of the spotlight isn't easy for kids whose dads work in the Oval Office". San Francisco Chronicle. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/01/22/DDGJO4EJ9U1.DTL. Retrieved 2006-09-27. 
3. ^ "Rotten Tomatoes Page for Chasing Liberty". http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/chasing_liberty. Retrieved 2006-08-24. 
4. ^ "IMDB Release Info page for Chasing Liberty". http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0360139/releaseinfo. Retrieved 2011-02-26. 

External links

• Official Site
• Chasing Liberty at the Internet Movie Database