Down to Freedom

Log Line:
When an insurance salesman is murdered by the police in a futuristic, dystopian Chicago, his family is tasked with unraveling a conspiracy that he has left behind.

Synopsis:
Anna, Michael and their teenage daughter Emily live in Uptown but Michael works in downtown as an insurance salesman. While Anna has prejudices against downtown people and ignores the injustice, Michael is confronted with the poor downtown living conditions, advises his clients as best he can and collects classified data from his insurance company, proving systematic fraud and discrimination.
Brian, the megalomaniac of Chicago, who founded the insurance company, then sold it to the government for big money, consults with the crooked mayor and orders Police Officer Judy to kill Michael for his actions. While the mayor is a faithful customer of Brian’s escort service that he uses to pressure politicians, Judy is not only Brian’s mistress but also plays new escort ladies into his hands.
Before Michael dies and his soul ascends to heaven, he manages to send the secret data to Emily.
Without Michael’s income, however, Anna and Emily fall below the income limit and must move to downtown. When Emily joins an activist group and hands their African-American leader Cassius the data, Anna fears for Emily’s safety and accepts the offer to work as an escort for quick money just to get back to Uptown asap. As the role model she wants to be, she doesn’t tell Emily about it.
Michael in heaven meets Joe, an angel who tells him he must make peace with his fate and that his family must not despair without him if he wants to be let into paradise. When Michael makes some spiritual progress and accepts that he can’t reunite with his wife and daughter, the angel rewards him with a rainstorm down on Earth that ultimately saves Anna’s and Emily’s lives.
Emily follows Anna and sneaks into a nightclub where Anna meets Brian who tells her that she could have a billionaire’s life if only she marries him. When Anna says no, reconciles with Emily then takes a cab back home with her, they find themselves chased by jealous Judy on her bike who tries to shoot them down. On a bridge flooded by Chicago River due to the rainstorm, she crashes and falls into the river to be taken away by it.
Brian now blackmails Anna. If she doesn’t marry him, he will use his influence to punish her for the whistleblowing of her late husband with years in prison. Anna finally changes her attitude and together with Emily and the activist group uses the scandalous data to create inciting posters and illegally place them on billboards all over downtown overnight, each poster having Brian’s company as the campaign’s originator.
Now Anna proposes to Brian to confess her crime if he uses his influence to make Cassius the first African-American police officer in decades. As Brian accepts, the whole community makes confessions thus making the investigations lead nowhere. In the end, Cassius becomes a police officer, Anna and Emily take heart and stay in downtown to stand up for justice and Michael’s soul is finally allowed into paradise. The mayor has to resign because no culprit for the disastrous campaign could be found, and Brian… boldly runs for the job.