FLY AWAY HOME . Directed by Caroll Ballard; written by Robert Rodat and Vince McKewin; produced by John Veitch and Carol Baum for Columbia. Starring Anna Paquin and Jeff Daniels. Rated PG (a bad word or two; somewhat frightening car crash at the beginning)
More reviews by —
TITLE:
RATING:
At first glance, it's hard to say why my daughter and I liked this movie so much.
It's got a predictable, slow-paced storyline, the kind that normally has either the kids or the adults (or both) in the audience fidgeting and checking their watches. And it's about an emotionally fragile child bonding with wild (but cute, at least when young) animals—a plot that's not only been done to death, but just invites double helpings of the corn that often ruins "family" movies.
That's a clue, I suppose, as to why Fly Away Home doesn't falter in spite of having all those marks against it. It manages to avoid the corn, and by doing that, lets the natural sweetness of its characters and its story carry the day.
Amy (Paquin) loses her mother in an automobile accident in New Zealand and goes to live with her father Tom (Daniels) in Ontario. (The crash itself isn't shown graphically, but the more stylized, and sinister, tone of the scene might frighten younger children.) Tom had left his family ten years before, so Amy not only has to adjust to life on a new continent, but with an almost-stranger father as well.
Father and daughter find a cause to work for, and a way of bonding together, when a gaggle of orphan geese that Amy befriends grow old enough to migrate south. In scenes of absolutely gorgeous cinematography, we watch Tom, and later Amy, too, teach the geese to follow their ultra-light planes, eventually all the way to a North Carolina marsh.
The environmentalist message is laid on a bit thick: the marsh is going to be bulldozed unless the geese arrive by sundown; and, guess what? they just do make it. But the inspirational beauty of the flight itself overshadows what happens once they land. I predict the ultralight business will really surge after this movie's been out a while—it looks like so much fun!
(Incidentally, the story of Fly Away Home isn't strictly true, but teaching geese to follow ultra-lights to better migration destinations has been done. Wildlife biologists hope to have the same success with other endangered fowl.)
The actors can take as much credit for the movie's success as the camera work, however. Daniels, who's always interesting, plays the reluctant father with just the right blend of insecurity and arrogance. And Oscar-winner Paquin is a delight; we feel for her grief and disorientation at the beginning, making her trimph with the geese all the more satisfying at the end.
October 2, 1996