La fine dell'inverno

I have never liked Palance better, although he has been in better movies. This was a sequel, and I tried to add Palance's name to the original, then found my error.

I don't ever remember reading Sarah, Plain and Tall in school, but when my son told me about it and said they watched the movie in class, I wanted to see it too. I borrowed the video from the library and watched it as a family. It was a wonderful story. However, I didn't know until a few months ago that there were sequels. I finished watching those this week. I discovered one small oops: in the second movie, Skylark, Jacob is reminiscing when he was a boy, and tells Sarah "my brothers and sisters and I would dream...". In Winter's End, those "brothers and sisters" don't exist in conversations between Jacob and his father. But it is a very small oops, and I only caught it watching the trilogy, the second time around. Great movie, a must see for good wholesome family viewing.

Excellent story of lives that need repair....one of those rare films that I could watch with my 7 and 8 year old daughters... Glenn Close was excellent in the title role. It was also nice to see Christopher Walken in a more normal role.

What a joy to watch this family grow up and see the same children acting in this series eight years later. Anna (Lexi Randall) is a beautiful young lady, working for a physician in town. She is in love with his son Justin, who went away in the army and was injured in war. And the newest daughter of Jacob and Sarah, Cassie, is an outspoken cutie, so transparently honest she often is embarrassing.

On a cold winter day a stranger shows up at the farm. He is slow to reveal his identity. When they find out he is Jacobs father, John Witting, thought long ago dead, hard questions about the past are difficult to get answered.

Glenn Close is magnificent as a loving mother, who wants only the best for all her family, and is constantly wrestling with the forces that tend to separate them. Sarah talking to Jacob said, "It's all so fragile, this life. Anything can happen in the blink of an eye. I could have died in that blizzard. Think of Justin, and John. probably more ill than we know. Time moves on. The moment passes, then it's too late. It's a shame, don't you think?"

Life lessons on honesty and forgiveness make this a meaningful evenings entertainment.

I think anytime you cast Jack Palance as Christopher Walken's father, throw in Glenn Close as the wife and Haley 'I see Dead People' Osment's kid sister into the mix-you have a pretty inspired set of castings.

I enjoyed also how the two kids in the first couple shows were brought back here-so nice to see the girl as a nurse and the boy as a young farmer. It's believable and well done, it's also the only things that either actor had done for some time, the transition to adulthood from kid actor is notoriously hard.

Some of the snowstorm contrivances were sheer Hollywood-but don't be fooled, there's a lotta heart and fine acting to go around here. The show never loses sight of it's ideals or center.

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