You could either watch this or,if you are short on time, just lie down on your walkway and have someone drop an anvil on your heart from the roof. Jane Wyman is very well cast as a deaf mute who gradually learns sign language, this is about one of one happy things that happens in the movie (it still miraculously manages to be inspirational). Wyman radiates a kind of innocence and purity that harkens back to the frontier, maybe even the puritans.
To say it's a sympathetic role would be the understatement of a lifetime. She probably could have gotten on a boat and gone to China after this and they would been like "Oh s**t it's Belinda" and made her president . You don't think you'll be taken in but you will.
She lives on a farm in Nova Scotia with her dad and raging a***ole aunt. The new doctor in town takes an interest in her (but curiously not in his smoking hot blonde secretary/ nurse lady ) as he has come across a new invention called sign language (and lip reading). It's amazing that sign language is a relatively recent invention and before that deaf people were basically just written off.
What made this movie great for me was not just the acting and story but that there are alot of outdoor shots, not just sets. The cinematography isn't amazing but you do get to see the port and the farms and the little town which really opens it up. There are some plot holes that serve to enhance tension and to save time, I won't get into it but it's not important anyway. a substantial and entertaining "weepie" from the old school. 1 hr 45 min 5/5
