Toothy Hayley Mills portrays an orphan girl who comes to stay with her stand-offish aunt (Jane Wyman) in a small 1912 town and manages to change almost everybody's life. This overlong film is technically competent, with good costumes, period flavor, etc., but is brought down by overly sweet and all-too-predictable situations. Richard Egan is brought in solely as a love interest for the never-married Wyman character, Karl Malden is annoying and over-acts as a pompous preacher, while Nancy Olson is pretty and charming as a maid (and on the DVD documentary has hardly aged at all). Wyman, an astonishingly good actress, deserves better than this drivel. The picture has an ending that has to be seen to be (dis)believed.
