Review of Where the Heart Is

Where the Heart is a solid heart-warming American movie. I am not an American and I am not overly fond of American movies. Usually they are technically brilliant but phony. Where the Heart Is manages to achieve emotional contact but pulls back just enough from most of the phoniness. The heroine becomes slightly famous for giving birth at Wal-mart but not hugely famous. By the way, I hate Wal-mart but it's use in this movie is part of American reality. I could give example after example of this kind of restraint throughout the movie. There have been American movies like Where the Heart Is, movies which touch on the realities of American life but still entertain; Junior Bonner is the only one that comes to mind at the moment. The female cast is strong, but the men also make a contribution. The movie has humour, restraint and charm. Occasionally there's a misstep and one often wonders how the two parallel stories are going to connect, but it all works in the end.