All Roads Lead Home - Movie Review

MOVIE REVIEW


All Roads Lead Home

Release Date: January 13, 2009

Rated: PG


CAST:

Peter Coyote ... Hock Banyon
Jason London ... Cody
Peter Boyle ... Poovey
Vivien Cardone ... Belle Lawlor
Patton Oswalt ... Milo
Vanessa Branch ... Lillian Cole
Evan Parke ... Basham
April Bowlby ... Natasha
Walter Coppage ... Dennison
Allan Kayser ... Tobius
Bruce Heinrich ... Satch
Hank Rector ... Preacher at funeral

PLOT:

All Roads lead Home is an award-winning drama for the entire family that will make you laugh and cry. Bell (Vivien Cardone), an animal loving 12 year old, becomes sullen and withdrawn after her mother s death in an automobile accident. Rebelling against her father (Jason London), she is sent to live at the horse ranch of her gruff maternal grandfather (Peter Coyote). With the help of the animals, Belle s work on the farm transforms the entire family. Life and death take on new meaning as the family makes some tough choices involving compassion, trust, and letting go of the past in order to find hope in the future.

Movie Review:

Although, the Cast in this movie was great - the Movie, itself, was not.

This was Peter Boyle's (Frank, from Everybody Loves Raymond) last movie before passing away in December of 2006.

The movie is rated PG, but I do not think it is a great movie for young viewers- due to violence. First of all, there's an intense car crash scene. The little girl's mother is killed. Later, she blames her father for pulling the plug too soon and giving up hope at the Hospital. He explains to her that he decided to hang on to her longer, but now regrets it. I thought this was strange and horrible. What if she had come back to them in that time?

There is also violence shown to animals. It is believed that a dog is in a bag that is tossed in the river under a bridge. A dog bites a man on the farm and instead of the authorities taking the dog in - the grandfather decides they'll take care of it, in other words kill, or rather, put the dog down themselves... and they are all so proud of the little girl for deciding to do this herself. The vet talks her through it and how to give the dog the lethal injection. I couldn't believe it... this is horrible - to make a little girl kill her favorite pet - how cruel and odd!

I was hoping this would be a cute family, farm, and horse movie. It was filmed, for the most part, in the country - but the story centered mostly around dogs and the odd relationship of the grandfather, who mistreated animals, with his granddaughter, who loved animals, and the son-in-law, who works for animal control, and his love interest, a local vet, who was having trouble tracking down why a lot of her dog patients were suddenly dying.

It was such a sad movie - until right at the very end - when they fixed up Poovey's (played by Peter Boyle) old hotel and turn it into an Animal Rescue Shelter.

See or Skip:

I must suggest skipping this one.

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