Preserving Family Traditions in 'Hope Ranch'
The death of Grace's father brings challenges as the family tries to preserve their ranch.

A blind orphan, Rose Duncan, who has a special talent with the violin. Jerome Trevor, a famed pianist, hears her playing and sends her to an uncle in New York so she can become educated. But the uncle is killed in an accident on his way to meet her and she is taken in by gang leader Bull Morgan. Morgan pretends to be her uncle to elude the police, and he sees the value of keeping her around as cover.
The death of Grace's father brings challenges as the family tries to preserve their ranch.
“And I think to myself….what a wonderful world”. Louis Armstrong sang about this notion via his classic 1967 song, an ode to witnessing elements of our life that should be but some reminders of exactly what that concluding line of each verse indicates. Now we see our contemporary realities and, just being honest, it makes a sentiment like this seem SO overtly far away….perhaps even impossible….to accept or believe could be. It sounds harsh, but again, so much of what is occurring speaks not to beauty, but bedlam.
Animation as a medium of storytelling can be thought to be open to all ages and as I hope my readings will reveal, they could be interpreted as transgender stories.
Produced by Vanguard Animation and released on Netflix, this animated fairytale movie has a lot of ironies as the story is told by the prince himself.
Tara Thorne’s film is equal parts emotional and comedic, illustrating the beauty and the pain of long term relationships.