Where the Heart Is (2000)

User Rating:

6.4/10   

Director:

Matt Williams

Writers (WGA):

Lowell Ganz (screenplay) &
Babaloo Mandel (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

28 April 2000 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

Laughter is harder... Friendship is stronger... Trust is deeper... When it comes from the heart.

Plot:

A pregnant 17-year-old rebuilds her life after being abandoned by her boyfriend at a Wal-Mart in Sequoyah, Oklahoma.

Plot Keywords:

Wal Mart | Oklahoma | Pregnant | Birth | Tennessee

Awards:

1 win & 2 nominations

Cast

Dylan Bruno	...	Willy Jack Pickens
Ray Prewitt	...	Tim
Laura House	...	Nicki
Karey Green	...	Rhonda
Natalie Portman	...	Novalee Nation
Keith David	...	Moses Whitecotten
Mary Ashleigh Green	...	Girl in Bathroom
Kinna McInroe	...	Wal-Mart Clerk
Laura Auldridge	...	Wal-Mart Assistant Manager
Stockard Channing	...	Sister Husband
Alicia Godwin	...	Jolene
Dennis Letts	...	Sheriff
James Frain	...	Forney Hull
Richard Jones	...	Mr. Sprock
Kathryn Esquivel	...	Mrs. Ortiz

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for intense thematic material, language and sexual content.

Runtime:

120 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Colour

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Finland:K-11 | Iceland:L | South Korea:15 | Australia:M | Denmark:A | France:U | Germany:6 (w) | Hong Kong:IIA | Mexico:B | Netherlands:12 | Spain:13 | Sweden:7 | UK:12 | USA:PG-13 | Singapore:PG

Filming Locations:

Austin, Texas, USA

Company:

Wind Dancer Productions

Trivia:

For the scenes filmed in Wal-Mart, various pictures of Natalie Portman as Queen Amidala in Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) had to be removed.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Novalee's mother visits her in the hospital, she is smoking a cigarette. She throws the cigarette on the ground and steps on it to put it out. The camera flashes to Novalee and then back to her mother who has the cigarette back in her hand, half smoked.

Quotes:

Forney Hull: What would a man on a motorcycle want with a woman's pillows?

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "ER: Where the Heart Is (#7.21)" (2001)

Soundtrack:

Grow Young with You

Strong Start That Slowly Fades Away

For the first 1:15 or so, I was really enjoying this sweet and funny movie about a young girl (Novalee, played by Natalie Portman) dealing with being pregnant and unmarried, who is abandoned by her boyfriend (Dylan Bruno) and takes up residence (unknown to anyone) in a local Wal-Mart. After giving birth to the baby in the store, she is swindled and abandoned by her mother (Sally Field) but survives and flourishes thanks to the kindness of some rather eccentric strangers.

So far, so good. Very enjoyable. But the last 45 minutes or so really unravelled rather quickly. I questioned the need to continually bring us back to Willie Jack's (the baby's father) attempts to get a singing career going. None of his scenes really served to advance the plot in any way, and quite frankly, the guy was a loser who abandoned his pregnant girlfriend. I didn't care what happened to him - even though some of what happened was poetic justice - and the movie could have been shortened by 20 or 30 minutes - without losing a thing - if all his scenes had been simply cut. I also felt that it was totally unnecessary to include (albeit - thankfully - only for a few minutes) a theme about child molestation. Where did that come from and why? It made a relatively enjoyable movie very heavy, and it was a heaviness that - for me at least - never really disappeared. The end of the movie (revolving around the relationship between Novalee and Forney (James Frain) was also telegraphed quite early on.

Having made those criticisms, the real highlight of the movie for me was Natalie Portman as Novalee. I wasn't familiar with this young actress until now, but she was marvellously cast as the sweet, innocent, naive young Novalee, and then showed a wonderful capacity to show her character evolve into a mature and independent young woman. (I have to say that, while the movie seemed to be trying to say she was a great mother, she seemed to spend a lot of time away from little Americus, but that's a minor point.) Portman was excellent, and I will look forward to seeing her again.

This rates a 6/10. Would have been higher, except for the weak second half.