User reviews

What a beautiful story of the horrible truths of the past, the beautiful truths of the past and a possibility of change. I'm afraid that the haters in this world and the ones that can't believe won't ever let us all rejoice in the 'Annabelle's' that should be. Made me cry.

The actors did great, with the script and screenplay they were given. Jamie Butler's performance was amazing. It seemed rushed and poorly directed, at times. Screenplay and director... same person. Might have been a budget issue? The cinematography was beautiful. Not a 10 star movie. But I LOVED it.

It took me three years to write this story. I loved getting lost in every character and plot line. I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to bring it to the screen and the novel has hade glowing reviews on both Amazon and Goodreads. I thank you all for taking the time to read the novel and have been so blessed by all of your comments related to the original story of the novel.

There were possibly many instances if this being close to reality. Kristen Renton gave one of her best performances if not her best so far in her career

She is a talented actor caught in a whirlpool of low budget and mostly low-quality films.

I love movies about the deep south so I started watching this even though the current rating is a dismal 4.8. Given the current political climate, I thought maybe the motive behind the 10 one star reviews were about something other than the movie as not one of them wrote a review explaining their rating. Unfortunately, the one star ratings are deserved. The writing is bad. The acting is bad. It's a shame. As much as I wanted to enjoy the views lovely south can provide, I only managed to hang on for about 25 minutes before shutting it down.

This is a really touching story written and directed by Veronica Robledo. The actors were all lovely. We really enjoyed the relationship between the two contemporary leads, Kristen Renton and Maurice Johnson but all of the actors were quite good. The portayals of the two women in the past-friends for life Ophelia (played by Jaimie Butler) and Emmalaine (KateLynn E. Newberry) were especially wonderful and heartbreaking.

The blend between the 1800s harsh and sometimes violent past and the modern day kindness works very well advancing the dance to the light and hope filled end. So happy to see a woman director bringing this meaningful story to the forefront with a strong vision and steady hand. She also keeps it from falling into gratuitous violence. Beautiful location. Nice cinematography. Put The Crickets Dance on your list to watch.

This poor quality vanity production might appeal to sentimental Southerners. While treating other human beings kindly as equals is always welcome, this film is very simplistic and treacly. The time for even well-intentioned white savior stories is past. Racism is systemic, and treatments like this reinforce the false notion that it's just a personal issue.

This movie is beautifully photographed with a superb cast. I enjoyed it from the first frame to the last. It has won many awards because people everywhere are touched by the emotional theme and brilliant performances.

A story written by a privileged white woman hoping to move forward without racial issues.

The whole thing is cheesy and stereotypical from a white person's perspective. The main character says some stupid stuff that gets written off as "you're not a racist" *facepalm* and the depiction of slave life is also grossly portrayed.

It's silly and cheesy. If you're white and haven't done some deep work you'll probably enjoy it and think it's lovely. Everyone else will see right through it.

There's far better period dramas that depict interracial forbidden love and historical racial alliance. This misses the mark.

The story is ok. The The script is awful! Would 'you's be my wife?" 'I's a promise' 'I's love you' 'I's give you all my love', 'May I's find you in my next life'.

I have no doubt in my mind that this movie was written by a very privileged, southern white woman. It might appeal to southerners- who seem to be stuck in the 1800s with their ideas and sentiments- but anyone living in actual 2022- don't bother. I'm sure she was well meaning - love will conquer all. We must move on as a people. Well the rest of is moved forward a long time ago and this movie is just a catch up for what most of us figured out on the 1980s. It shouldn't take a movie full of brutality, hatred, and poorly structured "love stories" to do get southern people to catch up. Smh black people do not need white saviors. Black people need fair education and opportunity and for white prople to stop moving out every time a black family moves in. What it did make me is ..glad to be a northerner. Not sure why anyone would want to live in antiquated times in the south.

BEST MOVIE I've seen this year, the transition between present and past is very hard to achieve at times but this Director did an excellent job. The writing of the script and the excellent performances of all the actors deserve an award. I must say the way the movie flowed kept you captivated between the two time periods . The deep south has always been a place I would love to visit. This movie will demand your attention from the beginning of the beautiful location to the unexpected and wonderful ending. A love story and thriller always has a making of a great movie.

So... some of the acting is pretty terrible...the grandpa sounds like he is reading the lines for the first time. When the woman gets beaten up by a client, the makeup is pretty terrible and you can literally see the edges of the fake appliqués. It's a rough watch if you are looking for a quality cinematic experience.

When Annabeth started writing in the journal I was HOOKED! The flashbacks and love between those women were very touching. Loved the story! I didn't expect to cry that much.

Acting felt like a cheesy Christian movie, except it made me realize Christian movies are actually far better in comparison.

Favorite quote from the main character: "It's making me question my views on... slavery." I don't think she meant that. Bad writing.

Slavery was/is bad, we can all agree on that. But slave owners weren't stupid. Generational plantation owners by nature had a far-seeing view (or they'd go out of business). They understood the financial benefits of growing their workforce by raising families. It's free lifelong slaves that would be working little odd jobs by a very young age. Childbearing was encouraged; women weren't killed for becoming pregnant on a plantation. You don't have to conjure up extra misery to get your point across that the slaves were living in less than ideal conditions under a tyrannical owner. That, among a multitude of other historical/social inaccuracies, made for an eye-rolling tale of excessive misery that couldn't keep me interested for the feel-good redemption I assume was coming for the end of the movie.

Also, marital intercourse in movies can be implied far more tastefully and with far less skin if one only tries.

I guess if you are a white woman who heard of slavery what her grandmammy told her thats what you come up with when you try to write some "cant we just foeget the past and move on already" story.

The story makes no sense, it is full of gratuitous violence, the writing is abysmal and the acting is the level of a small town church theatre group production. I tried suffering through it hoping it would get better bout boy o boy was i wrong. The "we don't see color anymore these days" ending made me wanna puke up yesterday's breakfast. It is absolutely insufferable.

Stay away from this convoluted mess,

This story deserved so much more. Unfortunately, the screenplay was poorly written and had no flow. We are left wondering the back story of these characters as they are thrown at us.

Continuity is lacking. The costumes for the historical time period are incorrect. The integration of the story in history is inaccurate.

I wanted to like it but I just can't.

The director coaxed some great performances out of the actors, and the cinematography is beautiful as well. The juxtaposition between the past and the present was handled deftly and there are a lot of weighty themes to chew on. I was consistently engaged in the narrative. All in all, this is a great movie for a wide audience.

This movie was bad, but I was entertained. The premise alone had me intrigued, and my intrigue was satisfied. I would recommend this to bad movie connoisseurs. Perfect balance of bad scripting and dialogue, weird premise, yet decent acting made it tolerable. The camera work is surprisingly good for a movie of this budget. I fear they spent most of the money on that and set design and not the writer's room. I know this film is based on a book, so before I place all the blame on the movie's writing room, I have to read the source material.

There were a few times I had to pause the movie and walk around in sheer disbelief that someone looked at piece of dialogue and thought "Why, yes, that's romantic." or "Yes, this definitely makes sense." The ending montage? They truly could have kept that.

This film is not worth the effort needed to watch it.

The acting is bad. The characters are almost instantly Not believable. The are modern stereotypes.

There is extreme violence out of no where.

I started to watch because the description presented an intriguing plot. It is not!

There is no realism of anything.

It is downhill in quality right after the second major scene which is intriguing.

It also lacks a much needed background musical score. I immediately noticed its lack which was surprising at first but then became to be part of everything else that was lacking.

Sad, it could have been a good movie exploring an interesting topic of human relations that change somewhat over time.

Was the book it was based on this bad too?

The film was very cinematic. I was very impressed with the actors performances with each character carried its own weight. The director was able to bring the essence of the movie to life. And brought each scene to the center focal point of the audience. This movie is courageous, inspirational and a story that needs to be told.