"Goodnight Mr. Tom..."

Posted on 08/02/2011 @ 02:18 PM

Tags: South

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Guest Blog by Ronald Newman, Ph.D., UM English Prof. (Retired)

I just watched a TV movie, "Goodnight Mister Tom," about the power of love to save a child.

Mr. Tom is a gruff white-bearded widower living in an English village during WWII. He grudgingly takes in a young boy, William, sent out of London during the German bombing blitz. He finds a note written by William's mother for the adult assuming temporary care of her son that the thick leather strap packed with his things is to be used whenever Will is difficult. When Tom sees the welts and scars on the boy's back, he winces and, enraged, throws the belt as far as he can into his garden. As the tale unfolds, it turns out that Will has been the victim not only of savage beatings but of terrifying warnings of hell and damnation.

The ultimate psychological torment, which occurs in the latter half of the story after he has been ordered back to London by his mother, is too gruesome and complicated to mention here. Suffice to say, she is quite mentally ill.

Will, terribly traumatized, ends up in a London hospital.  Visiting him there, Tom learns that the boy (his mother having fled) is about to be sent to an orphanage, where he will be subjected to apparently unenlightened psychiatric treatment.  Instead, Tom kidnaps Will and takes him back to the village.  Later, confronted by a psychiatrist from the London hospital and a member of the British Home office, Tom argues that, because he loves Tom (and believes the feeling to be reciprocated), his love is likely a better remedy for Will's trauma than psychiatric treatment in a loveless orphanage.  As a pleasant surprise, the Home official, portrayed up to this point as stuffy and officious, agrees with Tom; and another child is saved through love.

True, the movie is sentimental and melodramatic, but so are most Shakespeare plays and all Dickens novels.  And the actions of such great art dramatize universal truths.  It is no secret to the readers of this blog and to those who contribute generously and work tirelessly for the Children's Movement of Florida, that boys and girls can be warped, at worst their souls destroyed, by physical abuse and mental torment.  Deprivation alone can do the dreadful damage. 

Florida’s government officials would do well to watch "Goodnight, Mister Tom," available through Netflix.  In fact, I suspect that many members like me would be glad to pay the rental for any officials who have some influence over the lives of the children of our state.