What the Deaf Man Heard is a 1997 Hallmark Hall of Fame

Hallmark Hall of Fame

Hallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City based greeting card company. The second longest-running television program in the history of television, it has a historically long run, beginning in 1951 and continuing into 2011...

television movie that aired on CBS

CBS

CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...

 television on November 23, 1997. It concerns Sammy, a boy who pretends to be deaf and mute

Muteness

Muteness or mutism is an inability to speak caused by a speech disorder. The term originates from the Latin word mutus, meaning "silent".-Causes:...

, when in reality he can hear and speak perfectly well. The movie starred Matthew Modine

Matthew Modine

Matthew Avery Modine is an award-winning American actor. His film roles include Private Joker in Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, the title character in Alan Parker's Birdy, high school wrestler Louden Swain in Vision Quest, football star turned spy Alec McCall in Funky Monkey and the...

 and James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones

James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...

.

Plot summary

Young 10-year-old Sammy Ayers and his mother Helen are on a bus trip. During a stop, his mother ventures into a bar, while Sammy is asleep on the bus. She is then assaulted as the bus leaves. At the last stop in Georgia, he is woken up and realizes that his mother has disappeared. He takes to heart her warning to "keep quiet." He is taken in by the bus station manager, Norm, and informally adopted by Lucille as the entire small town looks after him. As Sammy grows to adulthood, he pretends to be deaf and mute as a self-protective device. Over a 20-year period, he hears many secrets and confidences. However, when he hears something harmful he decides to take action, to protect the townspeople who have become his family, revealing his secret.

The Ira Gershwin/Kurt Weill song "My Ship

My Ship

"My Ship" is a popular song written for the 1941 Broadway musical Lady in the Dark, with music by Kurt Weill and lyrics by Ira Gershwin.The music is marked "Andante espressivo"; Gershwin describes it as "orchestrated by Kurt to sound sweet and simple at times, mysterious and menacing at other".It...

" (sung by Bernadette Peters) is heard at the end of the film, as Sammy listens to a music box.

Cast

• Sammy Ayers — Matthew Modine
  Matthew Modine
  Matthew Avery Modine is an award-winning American actor. His film roles include Private Joker in Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, the title character in Alan Parker's Birdy, high school wrestler Louden Swain in Vision Quest, football star turned spy Alec McCall in Funky Monkey and the...
  
  
• Mrs. Tynan — Claire Bloom
  Claire Bloom
  Claire Bloom is an English film and stage actress.-Early life:Bloom was born in the North London suburb of Finchley, the daughter of Elizabeth and Edward Max Blume, who worked in sales...
  
  
• Lucille — Judith Ivey
  Judith Ivey
  Judith Lee Ivey is an American actress and director.-Personal life:Ivey was born in El Paso, Texas, the daughter of Dorothy Lee , a teacher, and Nathan Aldean Ivey, a college instructor and dean. She spent 1965-1968 in Dowagiac, Michigan, where she attended Union High School through tenth grade...
  
  
• Archibald Thacker — James Earl Jones
  James Earl Jones
  James Earl Jones is an American actor. He is well-known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership...
  
  
• Norm Jenkins — Tom Skerritt
  Tom Skerritt
  Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt is an American actor who has appeared in over 40 films and more than 200 television episodes since 1962.-Early life:...
  
  
• Young Sammy — Frankie Muniz
  Frankie Muniz
  Francisco "Frankie" Muniz IV is an American actor, musician, writer, producer, and racecar driver. He is known primarily as the star of the FOX television family sitcom Malcolm in the Middle. In 2003, he was considered "one of Hollywood's most bankable teens". In 2008, he put his acting career...
  
  
• Helen Ayers — Bernadette Peters
  Bernadette Peters
  Bernadette Peters is an American actress, singer and children's book author from Ozone Park, Queens, New York. Over the course of a career that has spanned five decades, she has starred in musical theatre, films and television, as well as performing in solo concerts and recordings...
  
  
• Tolliver Tynan — Jake Weber
  Jake Weber
  Jake Weber is an English actor, known in film for his role as Michael in Dawn of the Dead and for his role as Drew in Meet Joe Black...
  
  

Reception

In her New York Times review, Caryn James wrote: "Nothing seems real in What the Deaf Man Heard. Instead, its soothing, storybook quality has Hallmark written all over it."

The film was the highest-rated made-for-television movie on any network since 1991 with 22.5 million viewers.http://movies.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Hallmark_Movie_Channel

The film received Emmy nominations for Outstanding Made for Television Movie and Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie (Judith Ivey) and won for Outstanding Cinematography for a Miniseries or a Movie. It also received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV (Matthew Modine).

External links

• What the Deaf Man Heard at cinema.ucla