Heaven on Earth

Can anyone tell where I can buy this please, I saw it years ago on tv and have been looking for it ever since

This production was excellent with a great screen writer (top Cdn author Margaret Atwood), great music by Loreena Mckennitt (before she became famous, as well as a cameo appearance by her in the film), and many excellent Canadian actors such as R. H. Thompson and Eric Petersen (in addition to the very natural child actors). It is a well-balanced production that does not get overly sentimental or schmaltzy. The stories of the five children have some real historical basis and contain both great humour and crushing sadness. I only wish it could be re-issued on DVD and re-run by CBC or some other network given the interest around the current apologies in Australia and the UK (Nov 09) involving home children. If you have any interest in this subject, try to get your hands on a used copy of the video. You won't be disappointed. Six percent of the Canadian population are descended from these home children.

I remember watching this on PBS "Masterpiece Theater". It was the first Canadian production shown on Masterpiece Theater.

It is based on the "Home Children" project. The project's aim was to emigrate British children to Canada where they were adopted by Canadian families. Most of these children were orphans and abandoned children. As you can imagine some of these children were treated very well by these families, others were not. The program sent about 100,000 children to Canada between the 1860s to the 1930s (or 1940s according to some sources).

"Heaven on Earth" is loosely based around the plight of these Home Children. The story centers around 4 teenagers who are sent to live in 3 very different homes.

It is a very moving program and if you can find it on video or DVD (or if it's ever shown again on TV), I highly recommend it.

I still have a soft spot for this movie, after all these years. The young actors playing the four main characters were so touching, and the music was so haunting I can still hear it in my head. Of course, it was scored by Loreena McKennitt, so it had a very haunting quality that she captures so well. R. H. Thompson was one of my favourite performers, in the role of the grieving widower who is falling for the young woman to whom his late wife convinced him to open their home. I found especially interesting the attention to the society of the time and place. People were moved by charity to help the orphans from overseas, but once closer to home, the gossip and tolerance of cruelty were less than charitable.

I taped this movie from TV years ago - it was on a *Beta* tape, not VHS!! (All you young'uns out there go look up "Beta") so anyhow that tape is long since useless. The NFB in Canada did release it on video, I borrowed it (again, years ago) from the public library in Winnipeg. But unless Masterpiece Theatre decides to market its back catalogue ( which I doubt will happen) we are likely out of luck. Incidentally, I watched it when it aired on MT, and it had been edited for time (it aired in Canada, and likely the UK, before that). The Canadian version was longer, but I can't remember what was cut for the MT version.

This is a lovely story about English orphans - actually mostly Welsh orphans who were brought to Canada in the early decades of the 20th century. Many of them seem to have been unfortunately rather cruelly used as cheap labor - others found happy homes and a rewarding, if difficult, new life.The film especially follows one girl who was separated from her baby brother and underwent much difficulty reuniting with him. The issue is important because it deals with such family separations - often undertaken for the 'good' of the parties, but almost always a terrible mistake resulting in cruel separation from those the child has loved. The film also comments on the treatment of young women victimized by rape and subsequently victimized further by an uncaring system that tended to regard such girls as ruined, and possibly at fault themselves. It is a lesson that we need to remember now.