Novalee leaves Tennessee in a barely running old heap with her handsome, white trash boyfriend (Willy Jack played by Dylan Bruno) on a trek to the promised land of California. They are, however, not going to Hollywood or the beach, but are headed for Bakersfield, a central California farm town. The prospects of living with Novalee and taking responsibility for the child prominently visible in her very pregnant belly are just too much for Willy Jack. He abandons Novalle at a Wal-Mart in Oklahoma. In order to survive, she camps out in the store every night. James Frain plays Novalee’s friend Forney. He is the reclusive librarian who is saddled with a bedridden, alcoholic, mentally disturbed sister. Though inward most of the time, he smashes through the plate glass window of the Wal-Mart in order to get Novalee to the hospital to deliver her baby, Americus. The critical element of the story is for Novalee and Forney to find a deeper love for each other, one borne of friendship that is the bedrock of much more if they can just communicate and overcome their lack of self-confidence.

There are no unexpected twists in the story, just wonderful moments that unfold in dramatically powerful scenes with great supporting actors. Stockard Channing plays an offbeat older lady, Sister Husband, who is a warm-hearted combination of rural Christianity, earthy fornication, and motherly love. A short sequence features Sally Field as Novalee’s mother. Keith David plays an avuncular store portrait photographer who starts Novalee on her way to becoming an accomplished artist. Joan Cusack plays Ruth, a cynical but keen eyed talent agent.

Except for the tornado sequence that looks too much like a copy of Twister and the episodic nature of the film, veteran TV director Matt Williams creates a balanced adaptation of Billie Letts’s best selling novel that was an Oprah book club selection. Some will probably complain that Where the Heart Is gushes as a fairytale because, in "reality", young, unwed mothers with no family connections have scant chance of making such a success of their lives. Well, that is the strength of this film. What are fairytales but stories with a moral to give us hope that we can transcend difficulties, even those that seem insurmountable?

Unlike in a conventional fairytale where magic does the trick, Novalee completes her journey to womanhood by overcoming her own sense of insecurity and inability. Her magic comes from fully participating in the lives of others. Novalee is touched by and touches people who are suffering their own slings and arrows. Those whom she loves die, betray her, steal from her, are beaten by lovers, witness the abuse of their children, and yet they all persevere.

The most important theme weaving through the movie is that empowered women, even those of simple or tragic backgrounds, find and ultimately demand the men in their lives to be worthy. This is not a feminist diatribe, however. The women in this movie, as in real life, often attract or choose superficial hunky types for their tight jeans and a swagger, rather than a plainer man with deeper qualities of good heartedness, kindness, genuine respect, and love. The junction at which a woman recognizes that seeking out unworthy men only represents how poorly she thinks of herself is well portrayed in Novalee’s relationship with Lexie (Ashley Judd).

Lexie is gorgeous, but she has spent much of her youth getting pregnant by men who abandon her. Novalee finds Lexie nearly beaten to death with her kids surrounding her. After a hospital stay, Lexie unburdens her troubled soul to Novalee in sobs of grief and approbation. Seeing a beautiful, intelligent woman, who seems capable of achieving just about anything, finally admit to and let go of the self-destructive pattern of relationships is awe-inspiring. The two women hold each other with dramatic power that made us weep with them, both for sadness and joy.

This is the magic in Where the Heart Is. It doesn’t come from a wand of a fairy godmother. It comes from the heart of a white, trailer trash, unwed teen mother who, even as she gains the wisdom to keep at abeyance those who have betrayed her or will hurt her, ultimately transforms her life and that of others by the purity of love and innocence that conquers cynicism.