Handcart was an interesting attempt at recreating an historical Mormon event: the trek across the plains by the Martin Handcart Company. I suspect that their budget was very low and their shooting location was limited. The beginning scenes in Iowa City where slightly unconvincing given the fact that mountains could be in some of the shots and the ground was dry and rocky. Sounds more like Utah rather than the very green, very flat terrain of Iowa. Another sore spot for me, which I'm sure was a result of a low budget, came in the very end of the movie.

The main character, Sam, was reflecting on his experience in the handcart company as an old man, perhaps 70 years old. The actor had gray hair and a gray mustache, but he had fewer wrinkles than I do, and I'm 24 years old.

The love story between Sam and Abby, wasn't bad, but Abby had this Mary Poppins accent that was slightly distracting. Granted, Abby's character was from England, and maybe the actress who played her really is British -- I have no idea -- but her accent was a little too much. I actually liked the friendship/love story between Moose and Patricia. Although Patricia's accent was a problem for me as well. She was from New York, and she appeared to have come from some money by the way she was dressed when she first came on screen, but her accent was way to modern. Her accent wasn't refined enough for a rich easterner from the 1850s. Aside from that though, her relationship with Moose seemed much more genuine than Sam and Abby's.

Sam's character, particularly, was difficult to follow. I could never understand his motivation for many of his actions. Like when he told Abby he wanted to be baptized. Just minutes before he was telling his uncle he would never join the Mormon church after what they did to his parents, and then he's being baptized. I never knew what was going on in his head. Was he really converted, or did he just want to be with Abby? Most of his motivation wasn't revealed until near the end of the movie when he tells Abby what happened to his family when his older brother joined the church. Maybe this was the art of suspense on the part of the director, but to me it was just confusing. Then there would be characters who would show up just so that something tragic could happen to them, like the mother who's son got lost. She came out of no where, and I'm supposed to feel something for her? It's sad when little boys get lost, but I think it would have been more emotionally effective to have kept the focused tragedies on the main characters. When Sarah is missing, it seems silly and redundant since there's already been one lost kid. And even though Sarah is someone I know and like, the situation isn't as serious as it could have been had Sarah been the only missing child.

The movie had its moments though, and I thought it did show some of the heartache and pain the pioneers suffered. The ending might have seemed out of place, as if the writers didn't know how to end the movie, but it made a good point. The handcart experience wasn't for nothing, for it strengthened the spirit of many. And if some perished, they died in God's favor.

		--- Elizabeth Walters