When the grill must finally be sold, the women run a national essay contest. People send in a small donation and explain why they'd like to own the grill. Some essays are crazy or funny, but many reveal the longing for a place to start over and rebuild lives. Beyond that, the suspense hangs mainly on Nahum's suspicions that Percy is still a criminal and plans to rob them, and on the shadowy hermit who lives in the woods and whom Percy befriends. All is resolved in a tragic event that ultimately brings the community together.
Spitfire is earnest and occasionally moving, but never totally convincing.
Characters and plot devices seem overly forced and literary, and until the final moments, we never see enough of the Vermont hills used as locales. Satisfactory for youth and adults. At age 10, Jack seems to be 40 and has to function in the incongruous world of children. In Big , Tom Hanks was a man-child in the incomprehensible world of adults. The movie is an artful way of getting at the awful sadness of the life of a doomed child.