[2][3] It stars Sally Field,[4] Lindsay Crouse,[4] Ed Harris,[4] Ray Baker,[4] Amy Madigan,[5][6] John Malkovich,[4] Danny Glover,[7] Jerry Haynes and Terry O'Quinn.

[8] The film follows Edna Spalding, a young woman during the Great Depression in Texas who is forced to take charge of her farm after the death of her husband and is helped by a motley bunch.

The film received seven nominations at the 57th Academy Awards including Best Picture and won two: Best Actress (for Field), and Best Original Screenplay.

A drifter and handyman, a black man named Moses "Moze" Hadner appears at her door the night of the funeral, asking for work.

When the police find Moze with her silver, they bring him back to confirm the theft, Edna says she has hired him and explains the spoons.

He rescues her daughter, Possum, during a tornado that levels part of town but leaves the Spalding house standing.

Wayne Lomax, Edna's brother-in-law, has a fine time making love to married schoolteacher Viola Kelsey.

She learns of an Ellis County contest: a $100 cash prize to the farmer who produces the first bale of cotton for the market each season.

The congregation, after filling the pews, partakes in Protestant communion, passing the elements of the sacrifice to each other as the choir sings "In the Garden".

Eventually, Moze is shown in the church, though he is long gone; the camera then shows Edna, who passes a communion tray to her dead husband, quietly saying "Peace of God"; with the same blessing, he hands it to Wylie, who shot him and was killed in revenge.

The consensus is: "Places in the Heart is a quiet character piece with grand ambitions that it more than fulfills, thanks to absorbing work from writer-director Robert Benton and a tremendous cast.

[14] Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote in his review: "Robert Benton has made one of the best films in years about growing up American."

Canby called it "moving and often funny" and "a tonic, a revivifying experience right down to the final images", comparing it to Luis Buñuel's Tristana".

[10] Roger Ebert gave the film three of four stars, writing that Benton's "memories provide the material for a wonderful movie, and he has made it, but unfortunately he hasn't stopped at that.

"[15] In 1985, when Sally Field accepted her second Academy Award for Best Actress (the first was for Norma Rae), she uttered the memorable (and much-mocked) line "I can't deny the fact that you like me—right now, you like me!"