Terry Nienhuis Movies
- 2006
This made-for-TV movie is a remake of the theatrical feature Conrack, using the original title of the source novel by Pat Conroy. Set in 1969, The Water Is Wide stars Jeff Hephner as Conroy, an idealistic young teacher whose first assignment is at a run-down school located on Yamacraw Island in South Carolina. The state's imperious school superintendent Henry Piedmont (Frank Langella) has written off the unkempt, illiterate black children of Yamacraw as thoroughly unteachable, while the school's authoritarian black principal Mrs. Brown (Alfre Woodard), evidently unwilling to buck the Anglo-Saxon establishment, insists that Conroy doggedly adhere to an established curriculum that has never worked with the students. Instead, Conroy utilizes compassion and humor as teaching tools, reaching out to his students through a variety of humanistic methods, including adopting the kids' own archaic Gullah dialect in order to teach them proper English. Not surprisingly, Mr. Piedmont and Mrs. Brown are dead set against Conroy's "radical" approach to teaching -- even when it is obviously working -- but fortunately, our hero has a strong ally in the form of deputy superintendent Bennington (James Murtaugh). Echoing elements from another Pat Conroy novel, The Great Santini, the young protagonist is plagued throughout the film by memories of his uncompromising Marine-officer father, who has instilled in Conroy a hatred (and fear) of all authority figures. Produced as part of CBS's Hallmark Hall of Fame series, The Water Is Wide was first broadcast on January 29, 2006. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeff Hephner, Frank Langella, (more)
- 1997
- PG
Scripter Robert W. Lenski adapted G.D. Gearino's novel What the Deaf-Mute Heard for this Hallmark Hall of Fame comedy. It was filmed in Wilmington, North Carolina, by director John Kent Harrison. During the '40s, single mother Helen (Bernadette Peters) boards a bus for Barrington, Georgia, with her 10-year-old son Sammy (Frankie Muniz). She tells him not to say a word. The two are separated when she exits the bus and is carried away, leaving the sleeping Sammy to travel to Barrington by himself. Because Sammy won't speak, bus-station manager Norm assumes he's mute and deaf. Norm gives Sammy a cot in the back of the station, and he's fed by widower Norm's friend Lucille (Judith Ivey), owner of the adjacent cafe.
Years pass, but the grown Sammy (Matthew Modine), working as a handyman, still remains silent. Well-to-do widow Tynan (Claire Bloom) orders him about when she has him clean porch furniture. Her snobbish son Tolliver (Jake Weber), who steals church money, treats Sammy with contempt. Tolliver's sister Tallasse (Anne Bobby) likes Sammy, and she confides in Sammy, thinking he can't hear what she's saying. Her father and Sammy's mother, they learn, both loved the Weill-Gershwin song, My Ship. Throughout Barrington, the locals have learned to trust Sammy, but eventually, joyful junkman Thacker (James Earl Jones) stumbles onto Sammy's secret. Bernadette Peters is heard singing My Ship during the closing credits. What the Deaf Man Heard first aired November 23, 1997 on CBS. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
Years pass, but the grown Sammy (Matthew Modine), working as a handyman, still remains silent. Well-to-do widow Tynan (Claire Bloom) orders him about when she has him clean porch furniture. Her snobbish son Tolliver (Jake Weber), who steals church money, treats Sammy with contempt. Tolliver's sister Tallasse (Anne Bobby) likes Sammy, and she confides in Sammy, thinking he can't hear what she's saying. Her father and Sammy's mother, they learn, both loved the Weill-Gershwin song, My Ship. Throughout Barrington, the locals have learned to trust Sammy, but eventually, joyful junkman Thacker (James Earl Jones) stumbles onto Sammy's secret. Bernadette Peters is heard singing My Ship during the closing credits. What the Deaf Man Heard first aired November 23, 1997 on CBS. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Matthew Modine, Claire Bloom, (more)
