Best movie ever!

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

This title rates an "OK" as far as entertainment goes. The script changes a number of plot lines from the beloved Molly McIntire books which may annoy Molly purists as well as students and scholars of the American Home Front in WWII such as myself. (No spoilers here. Please read the books and see the film for those comparisons.) These books are an absolute boon to teaching young readers about the importance of patriotism and American pride as well as sacrifice on the Home Front, tightening one's belt, going without certain things we take for granted and supporting our soldiers. The film made Molly look like a self entitled clueless brat while the Molly in the books was a tireless patriot on the Home Front. Book Molly participated enthusiastically in scrap drives, rubber drives, and paper drives. She did not like the turnips Mrs. Guildford made until her Mother dressed them up for her but she did enjoy experimenting with recipes that helped stretch ration points. Another point is that Molly was very well versed in rationing and ration points and meatless meals. She would not have been surprised at the lack of ice cream in the soda shop and her friends would not have been upset over it.It's just the way things were. In fact, one of the books features a recipe for sugarless applesauce cupcakes because sugar was so strictly rationed. Molly made her own Halloween costumes and Christmas decorations because money and materials were scarce on the Home Front and her friends still had plenty of fun using their creativity to make something out of nothing.This film had several excellent opportunities to examine and expound upon those ideals and simply dropped the ball. The filmmakers also, while pandering to a modern day liberal left, glossed over the fact that in 1943, every child was required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in public school and did so willingly during this time.Costumes were a nice try but even then, they missed a few key elements and the actors all suffered from half-hearted directing and amateurish editing. For a movie that does not require one to think much, this is OK but it won't teach you or your children much about the American Home Front in WWII.

I grew up on the American Girl series. So, naturally, I was very excited about the books being re-done as movies. The Molly movie was just terrible, and threw in too much that wasn't in the book. Since the movie took place in 1944, we would expect that Molly would have become long accustomed to the changes that US involvement in WW II brought. Instead, she whines her way through everything. The movie shows a world and a family that managed to pass through 1942 and 1943 relatively untouched. In the books, she was excited about Emily's coming from England to stay with her family. Her father was away in Europe until the very end; he did not "suddenly" decide to enlist. What happened to her stay at summer camp, her troubles with multiplication, or her school's war assistance drive? Moreover, the finale never happened. Molly did not perform in the tap recital--she got sick from trying to curl her hair and sleep on it while it was wet. Can they get much worse? I hope not.

I liked it the plot line was cute and inspireing and it is a real tearjerker ecspsillay when Emily tells the truth about herself. However the cast wasn't great Hannah Fleming (Suesan) was the best of the children and did fair in the part. Maya Ritter (Molly)was OK but needs to work on her pazzazz. Tory Green (Emily) was fine but was too dramatic in some scenes. Samantha S Wilson (Linda)was poor in her part. She just didn't have the looks for it and was too fake in my opinion. She also needs to work on her pazzazz. Josette Halpert(Allison) was too cheerful and too fake and too dull. Her performance was so bad I wanted to puke. Overall it had a good plot line (even if it didn't follow the books). And the adult cast was really good. I look forward to seeing Kit next year and I hope to see Hannah in more movies. On a scale of 1/10 I give it a 7.

Due to having two daughters who are obsessive followers of the historical American girl dolls, I've read all the books and watched all the movies. I thought that the Samantha and the Felicity movies were exceptionally well done - true to the books and meaningful in presenting the time they represented for children. The same cannot be said for the Molly movie. This depressing and disjointed movie had little in common with the books and did little to illustrate the time period represented. The writing was just terrible - it made Molly look like a snotty, whining brat, had random cultural things dropped in just for effect(the jitterbug contest on the village green?), and was slow as molasses. I was truly dumbfounded at the poor quality of this film after the other two. Less focus on Molly being miserable and the constant deaths and more focus on the bravery and efforts of those on the homefront and what they were doing to assist the war effort and make due with what they had would have helped. More explanation was needed for children to understand - why would there be a scrap metal drive, or socks and blankets knitted, or rationing? None of it was explained, just dropped in the scenes in passing. The saccharin ending rang very false(I'm not saying what). That being said, the character of Emily and how her story was addressed was, I thought excellent and well handled. The acting was fine, if lacking in passion, but that was the problem with the film and script in general.