Truly Dreadful Film

not as good as all the hype

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

This movie was billed as "fun for the whole family" -- NOT. It was awful. The setup/beginning of the movie has a lot of great possibilities. But it just gets stranger and stranger as the time goes on.A "Family friendly" movie DOES NOT include sunbathing in the nude, implied relations between mom and a drifter, cancer/deadly disease for the little brother, flying around in the sky, and losing your business and home as an adult. Depressing and weird.My 6 and 8 year old may not have picked up on some of the innuendos but from age 72 to age 6 we all hated it.

This movie is better than the rating suggests. Patrick Swayze displays some tremendous acting skills as the ever blue Jack McCloud, a tramp and thorough loner. He is sincere and pervasive, as is Joseph Mazzello as Tom. The evolving relationship between the two of them is one of the three major themes of the movie. It is a relationship propelled by Tom's dear wish to have some male person around he can relate to and rely on, as his father is apparently absent. Jack, who joins the family as a stranger, develops a kind of deep and caring commitment towards the three family members. He doesn't push for it, it just happens. The second theme focuses around M.E. Mastrantonio's brilliant performance as Jeanne Holman, Tom's and Gunny's mom. Her despair mingled with hope and confidence makes her the archetype of the single parent of the Mid-50s, the era which is so superbly revived as the movie's setting. The third theme centers around Gunny, Tom's little brother, his belief in magic and fairies as well as his fears. This is the movie's underlying main theme, as the title itself suggests. The end, which makes you feel good and renews faith in what we have and ought to preserve and care for, reveals the message of the title and grants this movie an inspiring and deeply human message. Magic is out there - in everything we do and everything we dream of. It is the little things, the little signs of love and affection, of hope and endurance. Tom himself, as an adult, receives reassurance in his faith and his values by what Jack has done to his family when he was a young boy. The message is brilliant and makes this movie a solid 8/10. "Be yourself", Jack advises Tom. "And be happy with what you have" he adds much later in the movie. Hope and love will endure against all odds, if we allow magic into our lives. The same magic we believed in as kids. It is still there. You just have to admit it.

I watched this movie on TV twice. It's the first movie I've watched by Patrick Swayze. I was moved by the story and felt myself like that little Tom very much. I couldn't help crying when I saw the ending and told myself I should learn from this movie. And till then I began to understand the meaning of the movie. It's a good movie for a family to watch together. I think many people can learn from this movie that we should cherish what we already have had in hand. As the saying says, happiness lies in satisfaction.And it's not a big story, so it may not have got much attention from audience. But still I would say it's a good movie.

Certainly a mixed bag of comments on this one. I'm definitely one of this film's boosters. I saw it long ago on a motel tv in the middle of the night and have never forgotten it. My memory was that it was an 80s movie; I suppose because most of the plot was set in the 50s. When I rediscovered that it was made as late as 1995 I was quite surprised. The fact that women directors and writers were so heavily involved with this movie explains its beautiful emotional resonance. Even now as I write this I'm again deeply moved by the whole story and its telling. To me it's right up there with films like "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Miracle on 34th Street," etc. Recently TCM has been featuring great women screen writers like Frances Marion and April Guy Blache. I'm glad to discover that women are still and again strongly contributing to our collective screen world of emotions and feelings. Too bad this sensitive approach seems to turn some of your reviewers strongly off. Perhaps it's a gender thing.