Places in the Heart
| Places in the Heart | |
|---|---|
,_poster.jpg)
Theatrical film poster
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| Directed by | Robert Benton |
| Produced by | Arlene Donovan |
| Written by | Robert Benton |
| Starring | |
| Music by | John Kander |
| Cinematography | Néstor Almendros |
| Edited by | Carol Littleton |
| Distributed by | TriStar Pictures |
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Release date
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September 21, 1984 |
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Running time
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102 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $9.5 million |
| Box office | $34,901,614 |
Places in the Heart is a 1984 American drama film written and directed by Robert Benton about a U.S. Depression-era Texas widow who tries to save the family farm with the help of a blind white man and a poor black man. The film stars Sally Field,Lindsay Crouse,Ed Harris,Ray Baker,Amy Madigan,John Malkovich,Danny Glover,Jerry Haynes and Terry O'Quinn. It was filmed in Waxahachie, Texas. Field won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance.
It is the year 1935 and Waxahachie, Texas is a small, segregated town in the midst of a depression. One evening the local sheriff, Royce Spalding, leaves the family dinner table to investigate trouble at the rail yards. He dies after being accidentally shot by a young black boy, Wylie. Local white vigilantes tie Wylie to a truck and drag his body through town, for all the community to see, before hanging him from a tree.
The sheriff's widow, Edna Spalding, is left to raise her children alone and maintain the family farm. The bank has a note on the farm and money is scarce; the price for cotton is plummeting and many farms are going under. The local banker, Mr. Denby, pays her a visit. He begins to pressure her to sell the farm as he doesn't see how she can afford to make the loan payments on her own let alone run the farm.
A drifter and handyman, a black man by the name of Moses, appears at her door one night, asking for work. He offers to plant cotton on all her acres and cites his experience. Edna declines to hire him but offers him a meal instead and sends him on his way. In desperation, Moses steals some of her silver spoons before he leaves. Similarly desperate, Edna finally resolves to keep her family together on the farm no matter what. When the police capture Moses with her stolen silver, and bring him back to confirm the theft, Edna seizes the opportunity. She lies to the police and says he is her hired man. She sees there is more to gain from the situation because of what he knows about growing and marketing cotton, so she chooses not to prosecute him but to hire him instead.
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