The Spitfire Grill

Plot synopsis:
The story centers on a young woman named Percy (Alison Elliott) who was recently released from prison. She arrives in a small town in Maine with hopes of beginning a new life. She lands a job as a waitress in the Spitfire Grill, owned by Hannah (Ellen Burstyn), whose gruff exterior conceals a kind heart and little tolerance for the grill's regular customers who are suspicious of Percy's mysterious past. None is more suspicious than Nahum, Hannah's nephew, although his wife, Shelby, has a kinder curiosity.
When Hannah is bedridden after a nasty fall, Percy and Shelby pitch in to save the Grill and win the approval of Hannah, who learns she does need friends. Joe, an attractive young man in town, becomes smitten with Percy. He recruits a scientist who thinks that the town's trees might cure cancer and arthritis. As the plot unfolds, Hannah holds a $100-per-entry essay contest to find a new owner for the grill. This creates a positive change in the town, but the plans are disrupted by Nahum's suspicions about Percy and the revelation that a local hermit is Hannah's shell-shocked, Vietnam veteran son. Percy sacrifices her own life to save Hannah's son and prompts a number of the town's citizens to examine their own conduct more deeply.
Overall, the film deals with powerful themes of redemption, hatred, compassion, independence, the economic problems of small towns, the plight of Vietnam War veterans, and, to some extent female empowerment. The film somewhat mislead the audience into thinking that it will be Percy who finds redemption, but it is other characters and relationships, and indeed the town itself, that are powerfully redeemed through Percy's actions.

Tags: murder, storytelling

Review:
I'm sure the only people who would NOT enjoy this movie are the ones who grew up in Hollywood and believe everyone is like them.
Spitfire Grill does a wonderful job capturing the small town New England landscape.
At times, Alison Elliott resembles a young Jodie Foster as she plays this innocent, yet troubled youngster as she tries to start fresh with a new life in a new town.
A perfect movie about respect and acceptance, The Spitfire Grill takes on a life of its own as the story builds and builds with more secrets.
Everyone has their opinion, and mine on this particular film, is that it's one of the best to have ever graced the screen of my TV.I'm from typical small town America, and to quite a degree,Gilead depicts this sort of life.
She's not, but I am, and being familiar with my own accent, I can tell you she did it perfectly.I've watched it about six, or seven times, and will likely watch it that many more before Let it rest for a while.If you like beautiful scenery, small town life, and folks who are just a little short of being odd, you'll love this movie..
The movie takes place in a small New England town.
One of the reviews below states "I notice most of the negative reviews have been posted by men who obviously have no sensitivity."  Well, as a 51 yr old man, I can tell you that I really loved this film and it did touch my heart and spirit.
One of the best films that I have seen!The three lead actresses were superb, especially Alison Elliott as Percy.
It makes you feel like you are in this small little town, getting to know all the people.
Not having seen anything he has created before, I can only compare this film to similar fare one sees in the "movie-of-the-week" film made for that medium.I have no way of knowing if the accents these actors speak are really from Maine, or from the South, as I have never met any one from that state where the action takes place.
In the town, she manages to touch the lives of a lot of the local folk, who in return, show her kindness, after an initial rejection.Allison Elliott was effective as the young woman.
It is the story of how the arrival of a young woman, who has just been released from prison, comes to a small town as an outsider who is a bit rough around the edges at first.
Percy is trying to make a new start in a picturesque town where everyone knows everyone and where strangers and change are perceived as a threat to normal life.The depth of the characters and all the normal life's tragedies and people's strength and frailties are in perfect balance and wonderfully written and portrayed by the actors.
But the changes and beauty she brings to the town outlive her in the hearts of these people.This film shows love, beauty, redemption as well as great sorrow and loss.
Percy Talbott (Alison Elliot) is a young woman, who has just left jail, and goes to Gillead, a small town in Maine looking for a new beginning of her life.
She gets a job in a diner place called Spitfire Grill, owned by Hannah Ferguson Ellen Burstyn).
When Percy arrives in town, she changes the behavior not only of Hannah and Shelby, but of the local citizen, and deep secrets are disclosed.
The story is delightful most of the time and although having a good message in the end, I did not like the fate of Percy.
I know life may be unfair, there are many envious and prejudicial people, but the story is fiction so I believe the writer used a very "heavy hand" to conclude the destiny of Percy.
If you ever want to watch a film about the mistakes we all inevitably can make, the relationships and friendships we all eventually have to form to heal us, and the power of forgiveness and helping others, and the transcendent, trans formative power of love and connecting to nature in a way that reminds of our unity, watch "The Spitfire Grill." I don't think I've ever cried more emotionally at the end of a movie, and not a hard sobbing, but more like a life-draining, emotionally cathartic cry.
I won't let my words spoil the film if the reader has not seen it yet, just lay back, and enjoy one of the best pictures I've seen and felt, I know too many words like this can cause people to look for a flaw wherever they may find one, but I can only say that this work is deep enough to bear wrongful comments and survive and still be such a warm story.
The two good performances are Alison Elliot as Percy, the ex-convict, and the underrated Marcia Gay Harden as Shelby, the housewife who becomes her best friend.
The movie is best in the scenes between the two of them(like when they're cooking breakfast together at the grill for the first time), and I also liked the way first time director Lee David Zlotoff uses the outdoors.
Also, Will Patton, who I like, is stuck playing such a one-note character he might as well have "Warning: Plot Device" written on him, and Ellen Burstyn does her crotchety old woman again.
A young woman, Percy (Elliott), is released from prison and goes to a small town in Maine to start over.
Starting over in a small New England town with its clannish ways and suspicions of strangers is not easy and Percy has a hard row to hoe.A friend of mine said they don't make movies like this anymore and he is right.
The divine goodness and love in all of us is masterfully shown by the fabulous actress Alison Elliott whose portrayal of the deep genius of love in the powerful soul of a young innocently convicted girl shows us all how glorious each of us can be and how we can cause horrible results come from our laziness, ignorance or indifference.
WATCH THIS GREAT MOVIE, originally titled "In Care of The Spitfire Grill" !
The Spitfire Grill is a rare film that holds your attention throughout the movie.
"The Spitfire Grill" tells of the influence of one young woman (Elliott) on the people of a small town in Maine.
Percy (Alison Elliott), upon being released from prison, goes to the small town of Gillead, to find a place where she can start over again.
She is taken in by Hannah (Ellen Burstyn), to help out at her place, the Spitfire Grill.
Percy brings change to the small town, stirring resentment and fear in some, and growth in others.Roger Ebert wrote, "Watching this plot unfold, I was remembering last week's 'Heavy,' which also premiered at Sundance; its cafe was run by an older woman (Shelley Winters), and had a veteran waitress (Deborah Harry) and a young waitress (Liv Tyler), and had a regular customer whose name was Leo, not Joe, although he was played by Joe Grifasi.
Also echoing in the caverns of my memory were several other movies about stalwart women running cafes and striding above the local gossip: The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, Fried Green Tomatoes, Staying Together and of course Bagdad Cafe." Indeed, something about this film felt derivative or cheap, like it belonged on the Lifetime network and not as a film championed by the fine folks at Sundance.
She gave an extremely believable performance here as a woman released from prison for killing the stepfather who had impregnated her and then had caused the death of the baby by beating the mother.Ellen Burstyn is the old lady who Elliott goes to work for.
This misconception brings on the tragedy at the end that will drive you to tears.Note an interesting performance by Marcia Gay Harden, as a blond, worker of the Burstyn character who befriends Elliott.This is a very good study of rural life and human relationships..
There may be many similar movies but this one is different from any of those.A young woman gets off a bus in a small excluded town Gilead in Mane, US.
In this town, three women who have different kinds of psychological trauma as a mother work together in a restaurant "The Spitfire Grill".The protagonist is Percy (Alison Elliot).
The inspiring story of Percy Talbot(Allison Elliot), recently released from prison & looking to start over, finds her way to the New England small town of Gilead.
Percy meets & works for cantankerous grill owner Hannah Ferguson(Ellen Burstyn) who takes no mess, relies on no one, & shows little compassion.
Percy comes up with an idea to hold a writing contest with the best essay winning the Spitfire Grille as the grand prize.
Hannah is whole again & her heart beats with love.A wonderfully acted film with a great cast in Elliot, Burstyn, Patton, & Gay Harden.
I watched The Spitfire Grill last night and am reminded again of Neil Young's words in A Man Needs A Maid, "A while ago somewhere I don't know when I was watching a movie with a friend.
If the Biblical theme isn't obvious now, the list of names from the people and places is a dead give-away: Gilead, Nahum, Bethlehem, Hannah, Meshach, Eli etc.I could continue on, but I want to think more about it.A great movie, I give it a ten!Soli Deo Gloria.
If you're looking for the very human interactions between strangers and how one girl can change a town and the people in it, this movie is for you.
The interaction between three spirited women: Percy (Alison Elliott), Hannah (Ellen Burstyn) and Shelby (Marcia Gay Harden) is enduring, feisty, genuine and heartwarming to watch.
Perchance "Percy" Talbot is a twenty-something young girl who decides that Gilead, Maine is the most beautiful place in the world where she can live her new life, her second chance.
In choosing Gilead to live, Percy places her very real hopes of a new life, free from her past with this refrain, "There is a balm in Gilead that heals a wounded soul." One of Percy's insights in the movies in when Percy is helping Hannah with a cast on her leg and observes that "the healing of a deep wound might be as painful as what caused the deep wound to start with." Find out Percy's heart, secrets and hurts and see how her warmth and spirited heart melts a few hearts in Gilead and any preconceived notions they have of her, a stranger with a past.
After her release from prison she finds room, board and a job with Hannah Ferguson played divinely and wonderfully by Academy Award winner Ellen Burstyn, who has owned the Spitfire Grill for many years.
Like everything else in Gilead, the Spitfire Grill has a history in a town so small that the postmaster of it's post office is offended when too much mail starts to arrive.
Hannah decides to finally sell the Spitfire Grill and uses an "essay contest" as a way to sell it after Shelby and Percy convinces Hannah that it would work.
Shelby, his wife (Marcia Gay Harden) takes to Percy and befriends her at the Spitfire Grill.
It is on this secret that Percy's life and heart soon become part of Gilead and also the reason for the surprising ending of the movie.
This is a heartwarming movie that chronicles events in a small town when a young girl with a past comes to it with hopes of healing and a new life, believing that Gilead is where she belongs and needs to be.
Wonderful casting and beautiful scenery, the Spitfire Grill has a future indeed because of the girl with the past, Percy Talbot.
Its a story about a girl, who serves her time in prison, and after her term is over, goes to a small town in Maine to try to start her life over again.
This was an excellent movie about a young lady who gets released from prison and tries to start life anew in a small town, where she gets a job at the title restaurant.
A wonderful touching movie about a stranger in the midst of a small town.
A young lady, Percy, moves to a small country town.
This goes to show that The Spitfire Grill was a "word-of-mouth" kind of sleeper hit, because it sure as heck didn't get any vocal support from film critics.
There is a reason why this movie won the audience award at the Sundance Film Festival...it is a beautiful story of redemption.
Percy is an ex-convict trying to make a new start at the Spitfire Grill in Gilead, Maine ( real location).
A flawless performance from Alison Elliot  shines like a small gem from the gorgeously filmed landscape of Gilead, Maine.
Ellen Burstyn and the ever-wonderful Will Patton come close to perfection as they flesh out characters slightly underwritten, but the real discovery here is the perfectly attenuated portrayal of Shelby by Marcia Gay Harden that really makes this film as close to heaven on earth as you can get.
The Spitfire Grill is, in my opinion, one of the best film of all time.
A young woman ex-con who has through her time in prison gained a through knowledge of the state of Maine, chooses the small town of Gilead to start life anew after her parole.
Marcia Gay Harden was remarkable, especially playing a role that was very different from the ones she usually played.In this film I've found an interesting combination: apart from Shelby (Marcia Gay Harden), who was married with two daughters, there were three other mothers- Percy (Alison Elliott) was the mother of her unborn child "Johnny B.", Hannah (Ellen Burstyn) was the mother of Eli, an withdrawn who lived in the mountain alone for years and whom everybody else thought was missing.
Suddenly I realized that this was a story about motherhood, simply check out the last lines near the ending and you'll know what I mean.Percy's arrival and death became the salvation of the town and changed the people's hostile attitude toward strangers.I think maybe Lee David Zlotoff (the writer and the director) intended to write a "perfect" play, maybe this story was based on or inspired by real life experiences.
Originally released in August of 1996, it was a Sundance Film Festival award winner and gave us a taste of the rich talent and depth of newcomer Alison Elliot.Percy Talbott (Alison Elliot) has just finished a five-year prison sentence from Windham for manslaughter, and is released into the custody of the local sheriff of Gilead, Maine...
The sheriff calls upon the good graces of the town's matriarch, Hannah Furguson (Ellen Burstyn), a hard and spirited older woman who runs the local restaurant, The Spitfire Grill.
Always having been the central hub of the small town of Gilead, the Spitfire Grill begins to take on a whole new dimension as her devoted patrons start to sense a more passionate atmosphere coming from the kitchen, and gossip soars.But not everyone is happy about it.
Shelby's dominating and controlling husband, Nahum Goddard (Will Patton) has always needed to be the town's hero and center of attention, and his manipulative temper flares back up again when he notices the town's focus has turned toward the Spitfire Grill, and especially the mysterious new young woman.
When Percy is released from prison, she moves to a small town, Gillead, to get a fresh start.
Newly released prisoner Percy (Alison Elliott) comes to the small town of Gillead, Maine.
After Hannah suffers a bad fall, Percy and Nahum's kind-hearted wife Shelby (Marcia Gay Harden) start running the grill.
But as the camera pulls back, and we see bars, we realize it is a prison, and the inmates are unusual employees of the state of Maine.Set in Gilead, Maine, Percy Talbot (Alison Elliot) is being released from 5 years behind bars and travels here to pick up her life, and in the process helps heal a small town.
But nice older owner of the Spitfire Grill, Hannah (Ellen Burstyn), takes Percy in and puts her to work.
In this very small town everyone is curious about Percy, but none as much as Hannah's nephew, Nahum (Will Patton), who has taken it upon himself to watch out for Hannah.
However, Percy came in at that time to gather the food items for Hannah to put out each night for the mysterious man that she came to call "Johnny Bee" (from Johnny Be Good), used the sack not knowing money was in it, and put it out at the usual place near the wood pile.
He also caused the death of her unborn baby, and she killed him because of the abuse, but still got 5 years' prison time.The movie ends as we see another new face in town, a 20-something young lady with a small son, the winner of the essay contest and new owner of the Spitfire Grill, so named for the WW2 fighter plane that Hannah's husband had been fond of.
A bittersweet look at small-town life and the vagaries of doing good.
Near the end of the movie, she tells Shelby her story.
You have to ask yourself what kind of incompetent lawyer did she have, that landed her in jail for even 30 seconds much less five years for manslaughter.As you might have guessed by now, Percy dies by the end of the movie in trying to warn the AWOL son that the police are trying to find him because they think she gave him money "she stole" from Hannah.
But, I could not help feeling just a little lost at the end because it seemed the town had quickly forgotten Percy and how she died trying to save Eli. There was no mention of her name during the final scene and no kind of memorial to her love and unselfishness.