The Rising Place

Sticky sweet sentimentality, clumsy plotting and a rosily myopic view of life in the WWII-era Mississippi Delta undermine this adaptation of an unpublished novel by David Armstrong. According to our narrator, Virginia Wilder (Frances Fisher), a "rising place" is a once-in-a-lifetime moment of truth during which priorities reveal themselves and the future suddenly becomes clear. For Virginia, that moment comes one Christmas holiday, when she returns to her Mississippi hometown to visit her mother, Ruth (Frances Sternhagen), and ailing Aunt Millie (Alice Drummond). While rummaging through a closet, Virginia comes across that old standby of drippy, time traveling dramas...