Hilary Swank grew up in a trailer park.
She dropped out of high school.
So she could relate to the kids in “Freedom Writers.”
Swank plays a real-life teacher who took a class of students in a gang neighborhood of Long Beach, California, and taught them the importance of an education.
Swank says she could have used someone like that in her life. She says “education wasn’t something that was talked about” in her house, and she wasn’t a perfect student either.
Swank says she was surprised to see the troubled kids who acted in the movie hadn’t let their disadvantages get to them, and seeing how well-adjusted the kids seemed made her want to be a better person.
“Freedom Writers” opens tomorrow.
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