While searching through a hall closet for a fishing reel Gordo's son has asked to borrow, the three stumble across an old trunk that belonged to John's father. Inside the trunk they find an old ham radio, but time has got the better of the machine, and it appears no longer to work.
 

Later that night, after Gordo and his son have left, the radio mysteriously crackles to life and a man's voice is heard through the ether. Learning that they both share a love of baseball, John strikes up a conversation with the man and slowly comes to realise the man is in fact his father, Frank Sullivan, speaking from 1969. Thanks to some unusual solar activity, the two are able to cross the three decades that separate them via the radio. Seizing the opportunity, John warns his father of the warehouse fire that took his life three decades earlier. Forewarned, Frank manages to survive the fire, but his survival alters the course of history. In the new timeline that results from his survival, Frank's wife/John's mother falls prey to a serial killer whose death has also been avoided as a side-effect of Frank's survival. Only John is aware of these changes, and he must help his Father prevent the murder, and catch the serial killer.

Despite its thriller/crime story plot element, Frequency is a human story at heart, and at its best when dealing with the relationship between Frank and John. It often verges on the over-sentimental, but never quite reaches it, always pulling back just in time. Frequency moves at a fairly leisurely pace, but isn't sluggish by any means, and features one of Dennis Quaid's better performances of recent years. Frequency is a crowd-pleasing fantasy with an intriguing story that I can easily recommend to science fiction and drama fans with a taste for the slightly saccharine.