User reviews

...I am always disappointed.

Hallmark used to have such wonderfully acted and written films. Apparently that group of writers has died off because everything they put out now is trivial, dull, and uninteresting with really bad acting.

"The Fish and Wildlife Service will be all over you like stink on a pig" is an example of the sparkling rhetoric you will hear. I"m all for giving work to Actors of a Certain Age (and I am of that age so I can appreciate it) but Voight and Caan show so little of their acting abilities that it's embarrassing.

And I can see taking certain liberties with continuity but this is a hot mess. And the characters are just caricatures with each one taking on the role of good guy, bad guy (villain wears a black hat, for Pete's sake), put-upon daughter, big-hearted sheriff, frisky granddaughter, ad nauseam.

Don't waste your time. Lots of better things to do!

Voight and Caan turn in convincing performances but the movie plays like a pilot for a series. Its let down a bit by details such as California plated vehicles on a "Texas" ranch which is actually in Kentucky. Its entertaining but leaves you hanging a bit since they don't actually wrap things up. I know some political wackos will have their heads explode making a rancher the hero but the story is really a family feud storyline.

But why is no talent Melanie Griffith in it? How does this woman have an acting career. She talks like a little girl (which made her endearing un Working Girl - I guess she never grew up...). Not a fan of the young woman who plays the granddaughter either. She's just a mean person. This could gave been good with better casting and use of the GOOD cast (Voight, Caan, Polo).

The Original Movie was made in 2016. Many of these comments were made after the sequel was filmed. I truly enjoyed working with this crew again.

I love the age range of these characters and the fact Hallmark has offered something other than a rom(com) or murder mystery, but this movie is too negative. Whilst so many tensions in one family/community is realistic, it's exhausting to watch with not enough light relief to give the movie balance early on. I gave up, for now at least.

Dry and boring 2 hours of time brought to you by Hallmark about a ranchers family headed by Jon Voight who is threatened to losing part of their farm on a false technicality spearheaded by James Caan - Voights rival. Many extra and unnecessary characters undeveloped that eat up time. Bad acting all around. Hallmark can definitely do better than this. Total waste of James Caan, Jon Voight and Melanie Griffith. Real disappointment. Too much hype for the last 6 months only to be let down. Nice theme music and locals in Kentucky,though. Quality Stetson- like hats. Well disciplined horses. Melanie Griffith's makeup was done nice,too. That's all.

I enjoyed it! Just seeing it for the first time! What a rich cast. I think it's rather cute--especially the part played so well by Jon Voight! CAn't wait to see the sequel! I wasn't expecting "Dallas"; that was truly a powerful feature series. And in a different era. We don't even get ANY westerns anymore--if not for Kevin Kostner, once in awhile. I just don't get why so many people went out of their way to be so critical and down right mean in their reviews.

Its basically a winking two hour glorification of domestic terrorists like Cliven Bundy.

Dry, boring, slow, incomprehensible, convoluted and infuriating are the best ways to describe it.

Voight's character at his best is a clueless idiot who has no understanding of the legal system, management, or pretty much anything other than pointing a gun at federal agents.

Caan's character is illogical and seemed to be based on Western villains. I'm surprised he never tied a damsel to a train track.

Total waste of time.

Plastic, fake ... so overdone with surgery and makeup, her acting completely underwhelming.

Don't go near this. The UK release is actually a re-branding of a US TV movie called JL Family Ranch which appears to have been the pilot film for a proposed show that never went anywhere. It sets up lots of conventional, boringly-done threads of family drama (feuds, money worries, mother-daughter disputes, problems with alcoholism and gambling etc), which go almost nowhere because the whole thing is over in an hour and a half, all left unresolved pending the follow-up series that never came. Even the central plot about property ownership fraud isn't closed off properly.

What this is definitely not is what it has been promoted as in non-US markets; the UK DVD artwork (featuring a rifle-toting Jon Voight standing amongst squad cars and armed police officers) and replacement title of Texas Blood peg it as some kind of mash-up of Lonely Are the Brave, First Blood, and Harry Brown, with an old-time cowboy resorting to violent resistance in the face of persecution by his enemies and corrupt authorities. Just so you know - there are two gunshots in the whole thing, when fatherly rancher Voight scares some wolves off his land at the very start. The rest is tedious, uninvolving talk, with Teri Polo pulling emotive faces, a plastic-surgery ravaged Melanie Griffith unrecognisable (if not for her name in the credits I wouldn't have known it was her), and an ancient James Caan looking like he was going to bust every blood vessel in his head at any second.

As a lead-in for a TV series it is lacking, and you can see why the show didn't get picked up. As a movie...well, this isn't a movie. The earlier reviewer called 'BaronessFC-209-7408351' is having an absolute laugh raving so much about this thing; one can only assume they are related to / friends with those who made it, or else have some financial interest in it themselves.

Watching paint dry could be more exciting. Bad plot, script, bad acting. I cannot believe that people are capable of producing such bad film. I had to stop watching. An insult to intellect. A very bad copy of the series "Dallas". Need I say more?

Just felt too short for any story to actual be told. So many characters and 30-60 minutes more could have brought their stories to life rather than just introduce them and move along. What was there was brilliant and this was heading to be an 8-9 until I realised I was 1:15 through and the build to the end was coming

Given this film is about 72 hours (apprx) in the life of a ranch, quite a number of shots show the ranch and town covered in snow and equally quite a few shots show the same areas with NO trace of snow, which is rather a puzzle. Im guessing the version we watched on freeview 48 was heavily edited as it didn't seem to flow from start to finish. James Caan looked seriously aged. Jon Voight equally tired of holding everything together. I would hardly call this entertaining and its yet another Goliath v David story

JL Family Ranch was so blessed to have the caliber of Voight and Caan in the leads that the whole project became grander. Story was solid and the cinematography was rich, Wow. For a film that was budget challenged, the whole cast did such a great job they left me wanting more. Lots of plots but each one explained through the slow rollout of the story lines of the Lansburg family members. Loved the storyline of Rebecca and Lisa. Introduction of Terrance and Brady was full of promise for interesting things to come. And especially enjoyed Sheriff Whitlock watch the animosity of Lansburg and Petersen to see if that keg of powder was going to blow. Then, the romantic tension between the Sheriff and Rebecca was delicious to watch, to see if he could rope her. Sheriff Whitlock was trying but Rebecca's old wounds, current family dramas and Tap Petersen's legal shenanigans gave Rebecca a reason to avoid answering the draw she could not ignore for the Sheriff. Director and Crew gave this modern western a great look at what Americana is and took chances that gave this movie room to fill the screen. Director used all his skills to fill this JL Family Ranch story with all they could chuck in there.

Why in the world would casting put Sklyer Shaye as Teri Polo's daughter. Terrible dialogue; terrible acting; terrible storyline.

This disaster of a film managed to gather very old actors and stick them in La Grange, Kentuck for a few weeks to make a Western. Well, they thought they did, and they HAVE ... sort of ! I almost fell asleep about 15 minutes in, and it quickly got worse after that ... I doubt if anyone connected with this movie would be proud enough to admit it ! The question which must be asked is WHY make it?? And after all the money and the effort expended ... what is there to put about it in their CVs ? Please avoid this movie, even if you have low blood pressure !

A couple of veterans Jon Voight and James Caan are the patriarchs of a pair of Texas Montagues and Capulets and have had a family feud going on back 3 generations. It has to do with the involvement of Caan's son and Voight's daughter and what happened with them started the feud.

Caan's grown rich in material things and Voight has a nice family and a big ranch and makes out OK. But Caan for reasons both venal and egotistical is trying very hard by hook or crook to steal some more of Voigt's land. That piece has a well and waters his and other neighbors around him.

The two vets outstrip the others in the cast. Just calling them vets makes me feel old as I remember them both as breakout stars. The ending is right out of Frank Capra.

Nice film for family wntertainment.

I recently tried to watch a when calls the heart movie without having seen the show. this was worse. the family is massively dysfunctional. the movie starts with an argument and doesn't go more than two minutes without at least one more. not only is there drama within the family (more what you'd expect from dallas than hallmark), but there are multiple tangled plot lines including the whole town. there is no introduction to the characters that isn't drama free making all of them unlikeable from the start and they don't get better in the first half. i stopped watching.