It seems that the more times Hollywood tries to make true stories into mass marketed, family-oriented tearjerkers, the more times it fails. Not so, however, with “Fly Away Home.”
“Fly Away Home” uses the true story of Bill Lishman, a man who raised a flock of geese and showed them the way when it came time for them to migrate south, as a basis for a touching drama that should appeal to moviegoers of all ages.
Of course, real life wasn’t good enough for this film. After all, who wants to watch a middle-aged man raise a bunch of geese? So instead, we get to watch a teenage girl raise them, making for a much more enjoyable film.
And the nearly extreme dramatizing doesn’t end there. Amy (Anna Paquin) has just moved to her father’s farm in Canada after the death of her mother, and hates life until she discovers the orphaned goose eggs that become the center of her life.
The villains in this story come in all shapes and sizes, but amazingly none that are unnecessary caricatures of real life, and predictably none that get in Amy’s way for too long.
First off, in Canada, domestically raised geese, like hers, must be rendered “flightless,” achieved by making a small cut in the animal’s wing. But by attacking an animal control representative and then getting her father to help her in the confrontation, her geese’s flightlessness is avoided.
But by skirting domestication, Amy and her dad are faced with the problem of how to teach the animals where and how to migrate. So the plan is to build an aircraft, which Amy will fly, to lead the birds south.
This is just about the first place that Bill Lishman’s amazing true story actually has much to do with the film. Since geese fly at about 30 miles an hour, a standard airplane won’t exactly fit the bill. And half of the enjoyment of the film is found in watching his adapted character try to build a craft that will.
While most teenage audiences best remember Jeff Daniels as Jim Carrey’s sidekick in “Dumb and Dumber” or Keanu Reeves’s sidekick in “Speed,” his talent much exceeds those roles. A fact beautifully illustrated in “Fly Away Home.”
Daniels plays an especially complex character in this film. When he is suddenly a father to a teenage girl, he must not only try to balance his new family life with the life he is used to, but he must find a way to be a father to the girl who has just had her world crushed in front of her eyes.
Anna Paquin is solid, as well. While she plays a character that often plays second fiddle on screen to Daniels, she plays her sometimes supporting role with style rarely seen in someone so young.
Despite the fact that so little of “Fly Away Home” is specific to the true story of Bill Lishman, the story loses none of the original’s inspiration, and what it loses in reality it undoubtedly gains in charm. There is something in this movie for everyone, and no one should miss it.
Grade: A