A homeless woman named Hannah drifts into the lives of the kindly Ward family, in a small Indiana town in 1919. Hannah makes herself useful as a cook and housekeeper and stays with the Wards... but her real interest is in meeting their neighbor, teenager Peter Trimble. It turns out that Peter is the son she bore out of wedlock and gave up for adoption, and now Hannah has returned to town to see what sort of young man her son has become.
Adapted from the book by Lloyd C Douglas, whose inspirational work included The Robe, this earnest morality tale seems less impressive today than it did to audiences on release, despite fine direction by Edmund Goulding and an Oscar-nominated star performance by Fay Bainter (who was also nominated in the supporting category the same year - and won - for Jezebel). She plays a mystic figure who comes into the home of exploited inventor Claude Rains and his family, and has a profound effect on their lives.
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Paul Ward | Claude Rains |
| Hannah Parmalee | Fay Bainter |
| Peter Trimble | Jackie Cooper |
| Sally Ward | Bonita Granville |
| Sam Trimble | Henry O'Neill |
| Marcia Ward | Kay Johnson |
| Thomas Bradford | James Stephenson |
| Dr Thompson | J Farrell MacDonald |
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Director | Edmund Goulding |
