Today’s Prayer Focus

The Prizewinner of Defiance, Ohio

MPA Rating: PG-13-Rating (MPA)

for thematic elements, some disturbing images and language.

Moral Rating:	Better than Average
Moviemaking Quality:
Primary Audience:	Adults Teens
Genre:	Drama
Length:
Year of Release:	2005
USA Release:	September 30, 2005 (limited)

Featuring	Julianne Moore, Woody Harrelson, Laura Dern, Frank Chiesurin, Trevor Morgan
Director	Jane Anderson
Producer	Robert Zemeckis, Jack Rapke, Steve Starkey
Distributor	DreamWorks Pictures, aka DreamWorks Studios, a production label of Amblin Partners

“The true story of how a mother raised ten kids on twenty-five words or less.”

Here’s what the distributor says about their film: “Evelyn Ryan (Julianne Moore) is a devoted housewife and mother of ten in the 1950s. Her husband (Woody Harrelson) can’t seem to make ends meet, but that doesn’t stop the car from breaking down, the mortgage coming due and the bills from piling up. It falls to Evelyn to defy the conventions of the day and find a way to keep her family together with the odds stacked against them. Applying her remarkable resourcefulness and an uncommon wit, Evelyn finds her own way in the profitable jingle contests popular in the 1950s and ’60s.”

Positive
Critics

Positive

Positive—This mother of 10 had such love for her children and home she kept it all together, inspite of a loser husband, with her great postive attitude. She made lemonade out of the lemon she was handed. Her positive outlook was so infectious it helped her children not to be crippled by the dysfunction. She was brilliant and most of all Godly. I believe she had to dig deep into her foundation of faith.
My Ratings: Better than Average / 4

Rose Gomsi, age 50

Positive—My family and I loved this movie. The main character portrays amazing grace and the ability to continue loving those that others deem unlovable. It was one of the best movies we have seen.
My Ratings: Better than Average / 4

Elizabeth, age 34

Movie Critics

…Strong Christian worldview… Although the movie contains too much foul language, it demonstrates Christian love.

Movieguide

[3½ out of 4 stars] / …avoids obvious sentiment and predictable emotion and shows this woman somehow holding it together year after year, entering goofy contests that for her family mean life and death…

Chicago Sun-Times, Roger Ebert

…A spirited look at how one woman survived a difficult marriage by penning odes to Jell-O…

The Hollywood Reporter, Sheri Linden