When Calls The Heart - New Hallmark Series!

Janette Oke's When Calls The Heart airs Saturday night!!!!!

So there's been a lot of info circulating about the new Hallmark movie When Calls The Heart (aka Heart). I had heard they had changed the main actress mid-filming but the new trailers and behind the scenes clips feature both a blond haired actress and brown haired actress.

  

There isn't any information about this on the official Hallmark page, in fact all the Preview and Behind The Scenes interviews there are with the dark haired actress (Poppy Drayton) and the younger dark haired Mountie (Daniel Sharman). Then I found this trailer on YouTube that made the storyline make a bit more sense!



So it looks like the story will mostly center on the dark haired Elizabeth with flashbacks of her aunt who is the blond haired Elizabeth. The only problem with this is that the blond haired Elizabeth Thatcher and her guy Wynn Delaney are the main characters from Janette Oke's original stories (at least the first book, I haven't read the other three and don't remember a niece being mentioned).

Then I'd seen the preview on the Hallmark Channel and it mentioned about Heart is going to be "an original series" - what? it's going to be a TV series???

There isn't any information about this on the official Hallmark page but I did find this article that helps a bit:

"Hallmark Channel said today it is boosting its original programming efforts, adding another scripted series to its schedule and two pilots to its development slate. The network unveiled during parent Crown Media’s upfront presentation in NY that it has greenlighted 10 episodes of When Calls The Heart, based on the book series by Janette Oke. The movie pilot is set to premiere October 5 and the series will debut in January 2014. It joins Hallmark’s first original scripted series, Debbie Macomber’s Cedar Cove, the Andie MacDowell-starrer that premieres July 20 as a two-hour movie, followed by new one-hour episodes on Saturdays beginning July 27. Set in the Western frontier, Heart centers on young teacher Elizabeth Thatcher (Poppy Drayton) who trades high society life for a classroom post in the prairie, determined to prove she is brave enough to live on her own. She learns through her aunt’s secret diary that she had been a pioneer woman herself, and uses it as a guide to embark on her own adventures." - quoted from Deadline Hollywood article

 So the movie airing this coming Saturday night is a two-hour pilot for an original series based on Janette Oke's books that will start in with one hour episodes starting in January! I also remember reading somewhere that there will be 12 episodes in all (not sure if this includes the pilot or not). Hallmark's Cedar Cove series aired a new episode each weekend and just finished up (I watched one or two and didn't like the modern story very much, it got very soap opera-ish). It's hard to tell right now whether the When Calls The Heart TV series will have more flashbacks of Aunt Elizabeth (Janette Oke's character) or if it will focus completely on the dark haired Elizabeth's new life as a teacher. 

There's always got to be those bigger name actors in a Hallmark movie and besides Maggie Grace (who will play Aunt Elizabeth), the movie/TV series will star actresses Lori Loughlin (of Full House fame) and Jean Smart (who I mostly remember with a Southern accent from the few episodes I've seen of Designing Women). These actresses seem to enjoy the period costumes and fit into the time period fairly well. Their characters sound like antagonist for the young Elizabeth character. Actor Stephen Amell who plays Aunt Elizabeth's Mountie beau Wynn Delaney also seems to be a fairly popular actor.

Also in a highly interesting discovery the two British actors who play young Elizabeth's parents are period drama actors!!! Cherie Lunghi who plays Mrs. Thatcher has starred in The Buccaneers, David Copperfield (1999) and Horatio Hornblower, while Mr. Thatcher is played by Christopher Villiers who I loved as Tom Bertram in Mansfield Park (1983) and who Leaguettes will recognize as Lord Anthony Dewhurst in The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982)! Main stars Poppy Drayton and David Sharman are also British born actors dropping their accents for their roles. 

So what are your thoughts on the flashback type storyline?

Do you like that this has graduated from a TV movie to a TV series?

Have you read Janette Oke's When Calls The Heart and the other books in that series?

Will you watch this when it airs?

P.S. Not sure yet if I'll get to watch this right when it airs but my aunt is as big a Janette Oke fan as I am, so there's a strong possibility that if we're able to we will! If not I'm sure there will be re-runs on Hallmark that I'll be able to catch! Yipee! Writing this post does make me want to borrow all four books in this series from my aunt's church's library and devour them...then move on to the complete Love Comes Softly book series! ;)

Thoughts on Love Comes Softly Prequels

Not too long before leaving Maine my sister Bea and I watched the two newest installments in the Love Comes Softly series: Love Begins and Love's Everlasting Courage. These two Hallmark films are prequels with the story line taking place before Love Comes Softly, the first film they made. Having enjoyed most of the other films in the series we looked forward to watching these as well.

Note: As a young teen I read and greatly enjoyed all of Janette Oke's books in the Love Comes Softly series and would highly recommend reading them first because none of the films can hold a candle to them. But the films are sweet and do have endearing characters and some moments of spiritual encouragement (but not a lot). Both of these films are not adaptations of Janette Oke's wrote but are based on her characters.


Love Begins 
This film is supposed to start the series off by telling how Clark Davis (a main character in Love Comes Softly) met and married his first wife Ellen.

Plot: Ellen and her sister, Cassie, live together on their family farm that they have run since the death of their father. After a storm goes through, damaging their barn, fencing, etc... it is clear they will need help to repair. Ellen asks the town sheriff if he knows anyone who can help. Clark Davis and his friend stop in town on their way to prospect for gold in California. When his friend causes a fight with some other fellows Millie's Restaurant they both land in jail and that night his friend decides to escape, while Clark chooses to remain and re-pay his debt. The sheriff decides to make Clark repay his debt by working on Ellen's farm, her younger sister Cassie soon befriends him but Ellen who witnessed the fight in town still thinks him to be untrustworthy. Clark and Ellen become friends after a time and when he pays off his debt he must decide whether to leave for California or let love begin.

 

Thoughts on Love Begins: I actually quite liked this film. The actor who played Clark (Wes Brown) is more of my idea of what the character looked like when I read the books at first (add a scruffy beard and it's pretty much him). It's wonderful that Clark is portrayed as a completely honorable man who pays off his debts and works hard. Ellen was right to mistrust him and first and I'm glad it took her a bit to warm to him. Ellen's sister Cassie was a lot of fun! She sort of says what's on the viewer's mind and was an unexpected lovely surprise of a character.
Overall this is a great family film and a very nice way to start the series off. It sort of made me wish that Janette Oke had written a story about Clark and Ellen before Marty comes along.



Love's Everlasting Courage
This film is designed to fill in the years between Love Begins and Janette Oke's original story Love Comes Softly.

Plot: Now married Clark and Ellen live on their farm with their spirited young daughter Missie. Times are tough without rain so Ellen takes a job as seamstress in town to help pay bills. She and Clark play matchmaker for their friends Ben and Sarah who are both recent widows. Clark's parents Lloyd and Irene Davis come for a visit and Lloyd helps his son dig a well to water his dying crops. Working too hard Ellen gets worn down and gets scarlet fever which eventually takes her life. Missie doesn't understand when she's scolded for trying to nurse her sick mother and after Ellen's death when she overhears her father planning to send her to live with her grandparents she runs away. Will Clark be able to heal the relationship with his daughter and will rain come so they won't loose the farm? Will they be able to have courage through these rough times?

Thoughts on Love's Everlasting Courage: I knew this would be a harder film to like for the mere fact that Ellen Davis has to die in order to set facts straight for Marty to come in Love Comes Softly. Because I enjoyed Love Begins I had some hopes that this might be good too and when I remembered the romance between Ben and Sarah Graham (some of my favorite characters from the book series) there was a lot to look forward to. Unfortunately this film was quite disappointing on many levels. Ben and Sarah's story goes so quickly and they seem to like each other and plan to marry soon after meeting, I would have enjoyed a bit more to their romance and more kids like they had in the book. Cassie, Ellen's sister from the first film, isn't even mentioned - did she get married or die or what happened to her? Even though Clark and Ellen don't seem any older they have a nine-year-old daughter, who although sweet, is much older than Missie is supposed to be in the book. When Ellen gets sick halfway through the book none of the adults seem to take time to explain the sickness to Missie or tell her how dangerous scarlet fever could be to her (she actually should have been sent away from the farm like Amy March is in Little Women). Ellen dies about halfway into the film and leaves a lot of time to fill up afterward which makes the plot odd.
Overall the film is fine for family viewing but a bit disappointing if you enjoyed the rest of the series.

Do you enjoy reading Janette Oke's Love Comes Softly book series?
Have you seen these two prequels? What did you think of them?

P.S. I'm slowly working my way back to writing more serious period film reviews. Hopefully I'll have something more review-like next week. :)