I will admit right at the beginning, that this movie is somewhat fluffish. It is, however, a pretty good story, and if you're going to take an often used plot (father and daughter thrust back together after many years and have to discover each other etc.) and make a new movie, this is a pretty good way to do it.

And, this movie is among my wife's favorites, and it makes her cry whenever she sees it. It will also make her cry that I am writing this epinion, and hey... points are points.

So, when you are in your local video store, dust this one off and take a look.

First of all, while there is much ado about this movie being a true story, it isn't. Not in my book anyway. It isn't even based on a true story. The true story only goes so far as there was really a person (Bill Lishman, or Wild Bill Lishman as he is apparently known) who has trained Canadian Geese to follow him in his ultralight so that he could teach them new migration patterns and so on.

See the website: www.operationmigration.org

The website is actually pretty cool, and the project of teaching various birds safer migration patterns goes on. A continuing project is alluded to in the movie.

However, a guy flying his ultralight with birds behind him does not this movie make, if you ask me.

The story goes something like this.

Daniels is basically an eccentricish artist/inventor who lives on a farm in Canada. His daughter, Anna Paquin, is suddenly thrust into his life because his ex-wife dies in a car accident.

Anna has spent most of her life with her mother in New Zealand, and when she arrives in Canada she is not particularly interested in her father.

Daniels, who leads a semi-reclusive, rather odd sort of existence, is not exactly sure what to do with the daughter he suddenly finds himself with.

Daniels, by the way, is one of my favorite actors on the semi-rare occasions that he picks a decent movie to be in. Check out 'Grand Tour:Disaster in Time', a made for television movie from about 1992.

Some of the best parts in this movie actually come during this initial uncomfortableness. The best acting, and the scenes which really make you feel for and believe the characters.

Before long, Anna becomes the adoptive mother of some Canadian Geese. This happens as a result of some nasties who are, naturally, trying to destroy some of the natural Canadian beauty near Daniels' farm.

The geese become the turning point in the bond between father and daughter. Daughter becomes thoroughly focused on the geese and their welfare. Father finally has something he can help daughter with. Father also sees a bit of himself in his daughter's single-mindedness.

While father and daughter come together somewhat through the geese, our problem arises. The geese are going to need to go south for the winter. Of course, there are several problems with this. The geese don't have a mother who can show them how to fly south for the winter, for one. Then there is the more 'scary' problem, which is that Ranger Bob (or whatever his name is) is going to try and force the goodly father and daughter to clip the wings of the geese. (I turned that sentence around several times before I decided on that particular wording so as to avoid having to use 'geese's wings' because no one should ever say 'geese's'... it's just weird)

Apparently Canada has this law about clipping the wings of all the Canadian Geese they can get their hands on, which are the non-wild ones I suppose, or it might be just the ones that cute, little girls find... I'm not entirely sure. Anyway, the park ranger Gestapo officer in charge of whacking parts off little girls' pets makes several appearances throughout the movie.

Enter the ultralight.

Dad gets the idea that since the geese follow his daughter everywhere she goes, they might somehow manage to get them to follow dad in his ultralight. He can then lead them south for the winter.

That doesn't quite cut it, and dad has to teach his daughter to fly. Dad teaching daughter, daughter teaching geese. It's all quite warm and fuzzy. Right down to the goose shaped ultralight dad builds for his daughter.

There's no use telling the rest of the plot. Let's just say it's not as easy to fly your geese south for the winter as it might sound.

There are some very worthy moments in the movie, and even some of the scenes that may have you rolling your eyes serve their purpose.

When father and daughter are getting very near their goal and something goes wrong with father's ultralight and he crashes, you might find yourself loathing the traditional, final stumbling block. In this case, however, the father crashing calls us back to much earlier in the movie when daughter crashed in her first attempt at ultralight flight.

When Anna looks up and sees Daniels crying over her, she gets her first realization that her father really cares about her. She was, of course, not interested in believing that since her father would have been around if he cared.

When Daniels crashes, Anna gets a shocking look at how much she cares about him.

Sure the movie is somewhat simplistically done, but you have to look at what the movie is trying to be. It's trying to be a family movie, and how complex can you really get away with in a family movie?

Now, I liked the movie partially because I am just the sort of nut that might one day find himself on a farm in Canada building sculptural replicas of lunar landers and so on.

One of the most unfortunate things about the movie is that Anna Paquin has a really annoying scream, and screaming comes up quite frequently.


Other than that this is a very worthy movie in the family category. An excellent performance by Daniels, and Paquin does pretty well herself.

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS