I pionieri del Wisconsin

I've seen this once- many years ago, buried in a package of old movies the local station owned. For most of the way, it's a good, realistic view of frontier life, like something out of the Waltons or Little House on the Prairie. At the end, however, it becomes something much more special than that. I call the end of this film the "Rock Test". If you can watch it and not cry, you're a rock. The thing that makes it work is that it's not maudlin, just real and human. A rare gem, the sort of thing that makes it worth scanning the TV listings looking for it. Believe me, if you find it, it will be the best thing on the page.

I took a quick look at the career of director Allen Reisner who worked at Studio One before taking on this feature film. Reisner went back to working mostly for television after All Mine To Give. But never in his career did he come close to doing anything as good as this film. Very few have.

All Mine To Give has become a Christmas classic in its own right as well received as It's A Wonderful Life. The story though is one of the most depressing you'll ever see and yet it's about an unconquerable spirit present even in our children.

The film is the story of the Eunson family, Scottish immigrants who settle in frontier Wisconsin in the 1850s. The parents are Cameron Mitchell and Glynis Johns who then raise five children, the oldest being Rex Thompson.

All Mine To Give while showing the Eunsons and most of the rest of their neighbors as decent folks is a no frills, uncompromising look at frontier life in those days. So many diseases we've conquered now were present back then. When both Mitchell and Johns fall to them the orphaned Eunson kids are left in a terrible fix. It's up to Thompson to decide their fates.

And this is all happening at Christmas time which has made All Mine To Give a staple on TCM in December. The story is based on a true incident at the time this story is taking place. It also is strikingly similar to what happened to Herbert Hoover and his two siblings when they were orphaned.

Such fine character players as Sylvia Field, Reta Shaw, Royal Dano, Alan Hale, Jr. play some of the townspeople. All Mine To Give will pull on so many emotions at once you'll be drained with a single viewing. Filmed during the last years of RKO Studios, All Mine To Give is a flawless holiday classic with a great story and a wonderful cast to tell it.

This is a tissue-tugger if there ever was one! I haven't seen this movie in several years but growing up, I always made a point of seeing this movie. It is one of the few movies that as a young man and an adult that I have watched multiple times. I always found it very moving and an emotional experience. I don't normally cry at movies but this one always made me misty. I looked for it for several years, telling my wife what a great movie it was to see and how I wanted to share it with her. I finally wrote to several of the TV networks and got one to respond with the next time it was going to be on television. It was a big night in our household, popcorn popped, tissues handy, and kids to bed as we watched the movie. As the finally credits start rolling and I'm holding back from getting misty, I look to my wife, ask her what she thought and she answered with, "Is that all there is to it?" I was crushed to say the least.

At any rate, it still moved me, though I hadn't seen it in years. You feel for the struggles of the family, the harshness of the wilderness and the era for growing family. You see how adversity makes the family more close-knit and the bond between one another grows. No TV, no Nintendo, none of the amenities of today but the love and understanding that builds in a large family that relies on each other.

When we were in high school and college, my sister and I used to watch this movie every time it came on TV. If it started at 3AM, we were there with our tissues! We watched it so many times, that I would start to cry even before any thing sad happens. My sister and I are trying to find a copy so we can share it with our daughters. So far I've found 14 Video stores nation-wide that still carry it, but I don't know yet if any of them will rent it to me via the mail. I'm hopeful though, because any one who has ever seen this special movie, never forgets it. I now have seven children of my own, and even though none of them have seen it, they all know the story, and the title. It's difficult to summarize ALL MINE TO GIVE, without giving the story away. If you see it once, you'll look forward to seeing it again and again. I don't think there is another movie of this type that elicits such a universal reaction from the viewers.

We take for granted a lot of things in our lives. The struggle of the first settlers of this country is something we don't tend to think much about, yet, what these people endured during the XIX century, is something most of us, today, are not prepared to do, myself included.

The film is a sweet account to a Scottish family settling in Wisconsin. As directed by Alan Reisner, it makes us look into the past as this family decides to take root in a hostile environment. It was a surprise to hear the score by the great Max Steiner in the background, as it helps the film tremendously.

The acting by Cameron Mitchell, Glynis Johns, and the rest of the cast is predictable. The children are wonderful, as they decide to continue the legacy of their parents.