Places in the Heart

I was sad to find I didn't love this as much as I had remembered from its release nearly 30 years ago.

The acting is terrific, and the film looks great. But the main plot has elements of familiar melodramatic clichés that bugged me more now in a way they didn't in 1984. The race to save the farm, and the 'we'll do it despite the odds!' dialogue felt a little too Hollywood this time around, as did the 'perfect' gallery of downtrodden, oppressed outsiders (the single mother, the African-American, the blind man).

At the same time, the subplot of the romantic triangle between Ed Harris, Lindsay Crouse and Amy Madigan, while wonderfully acted, really seemed to have very little at all to do with the rest of the film.

That said, all the acting (Sally Field, Danny Glover, John Malcovich) is terrific, and the details of time and place are rich and vivid is slightly (intentionally) softened by the haze of the passing years (Benton grew up in the town where the story takes place).

And that wonderful long last shot, which gives the whole film a larger context, is still a powerful and brave way to end a story.

When Robert Benton wrote and directed Places in the Heart he created his own Citizen Kane. Like Orson Welles he will spend the rest of his life trying to better it and won't succeed.

Places in the Heart takes place in Waxahachie, Texas in 1935 and our director was born there in 1932. The film is a personal vision of his childhood in that small Texas town. It bears a whole lot of resemblance to To Kill a Mockingbird, except that the adult protagonist is not a widower lawyer, but the widowed wife of a sheriff left to fend for herself after her husband is killed.

Benton creates his characters with a loving hand, but that does not mean he doesn't see the flaws in the people there, the racism, the sexism, the hypocrisy and the pettiness. Field's husband, Ray Baker, is killed by a drunken black man accidentally. Killing a law enforcement official probably would have gotten him legally executed in any event, but the town administers its own brand of justice to the perpetrator.

That being said, it still doesn't solve the problem of a woman who has no education or training to support herself and her family. Sally gets the idea to grow cotton on the few acres her husband left her and gets a pair of strange allies in John Malkovich and Danny Glover to help her.

Glover is an itinerant hobo who is the one who if he knows anything knows cotton from his sharecropping background. He's who really holds the family together in the crisis. John Malkovich is a blind man whose brother-in-law is unctuous town banker, Lane Smith, who essentially dumps him on Field because he doesn't want to care for him. Malkovich who was nominated for Best Supporting Actor proves to be a faithful friend.

Lindsay Crouse was nominated for Best Supporting Actress as Field's sister. There's a subplot in the film involving her and her philandering husband Ed Harris.

Robert Benton won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay and was nominated for Best Director and Sally Field won her second Oscar for Places in the Heart. Her character isn't as feisty as her first Oscar winner, Norma Rae, but Edna Spalding certainly has the same grit.

Period country and gospel music make up the soundtrack for Places in the Heart. Old line Protestant hymns Blessed Assurance begins the film and In The Garden is the theme for the surreal ending.

I can't describe the ending except that it is one of the most beautiful in the history of cinema. It's a vision of what promise we have either in heaven or a utopia we make on earth where the things that divide humankind are washed away and we are in fellowship with each other and our Maker.

You have to have a heart of diamond if you are not moved by Places in the Heart.

This was a wonderful film which unfortunately I haven't seen for some years, so forget many of the subtleties. Sally Field is superb in the role of the Depression era Texas widow, Emma Spalding, and deserved her second Oscar which showed that yes, we really do like her. I always love this actress, who is especially compelling in the dramatic Norma Rae and charming in the romantic comedy, Murphy's Romance.

The film tells the tale of a good, kind, loving, and strong woman, the widow, Emma (who has been left with with two children to raise on her own) and the pair of disparate characters who help her to literally 'save the farm'...the black drifter, Moze, who plants her cotton, and the intriguing blind border, Mr. Will, that she is forced to take on to appease the nasty banker. Because of mortgage difficulties, Emma's farm and in fact, her life are always in the hands of the local bank manager. The unlikely bond between the trio (Emma, Moze, and Mr. Will) and their shared struggle is always the very heart of the film. There are, however, other local small town characters portrayed here, including a sub-plot revolving around a pair of married folk engaged in an adulterous affair.

It's all so much more meaningful than yet another film about a widow's romance. I don't know that the local couple's affair contributes much to the movie, unless, Hollywood style, there just had to be some sexual implications of some sort or other somewhere. Many others seem to agree that this sub-plot is superfluous.

The other major roles are well cast, with Danny Glover and John Malkovich sympathetically portraying respectively Moze and Mr. Wills. As for the man involved in the affair, Ed Harris (whom I actually kinda like) always does a brilliant job portraying any sort of somewhat sleazy character!

Memorable moments...One moving scene has lingered in my mind all these years, when the newly widowed Emma helps prepare the body of her sheriff husband, Royce, for burial. This is of course so alien to us today, when compared with our modern detached funeral parlors. There is an amazing tornado scene, wonderfully photographed, that brilliantly conveys the terror of the characters seeking shelter. Plenty of high drama there! The movie also has anti-racism themes, with a dramatic scenario involving some local Ku Klux Klan members or equivalent, in which Mr. Will plays a pivotal role. And a fabulous, touching scene where Emma dances at a community shindig with her young son, Frank. I recalled it vividly a few years later during a 'first dance' with my own son.

Certainly not an action flick, but a thoughtful, touching, heartwarming story with very sympathetic characters that will engage you and earn a place in YOUR heart. The movie has a quietly dramatic ending some have questioned, but I personally found it perfect. As another reviewer cleverly noted, it 'seals' the film.

"Places in the Heart" is one of the more under-rated films of the 1980s. Somewhat based on director Robert Benton's experiences as a youth in Waxahachie, Texas, the film deals with one woman's (Sally Field in her second Oscar-winning performance) struggle to keep her land, house, and children after her husband is killed in a freak accident. She decides that the only way to keep her life is to grow and harvest cotton (not the easiest thing in the world to do, especially during the Depression). Drifter Danny Glover is the catalyst who can bring everything together and the blind John Malkovich (Oscar-nominated) also proves to be an asset. However, racists threaten to stop Field by eliminating Glover. On the other side of town Field's sister (Lindsay Crouse, in her Oscar-nominated role) is having troubles with her husband (Ed Harris). He is having an affair with a local school-teacher (Amy Madigan) and this development could ruin her life just as quickly as Field's life has changed. "Places in the Heart" benefits from great performances, but the direction and screenplay are also second-to-none. An excellent film that was nominated for the Best Picture Oscar in 1984. 5 stars out of 5.

This is a great film. I remembered just how it was when I was growing up. Every scene is magnificant. This is how Texas was during this era. Edna Spaulding could have been one of my relatives. Sally Field does not act Edna Spaulding, she is Edna Spaulding.