Not sure why this series was converted to film. The casting if bad. Not sure why anyone would pay Jason Priestley to act - he's incredibly stilted.The story - finished by another writer after the authors death - suffers as compared to the others, as you lose all sympathy for Heaven.
14 Reviews
Had it's good parts
Slytherinreader12 August 2019
Warning: Spoilers
Spoilers*
Magically grandpa Tobey is alive and well and remains that way the whole movie. To bad we lost him during this book.
Tom's death was majorly underplayed. A major let down. In the book tom dies a heroic death and everyone finally respects the casteel name. Not for heavens money but for Tom saving another's life. In the book he rushes to help them get the lion under control saving the man from death and dies in his attempt. Instead the movie just has him attacked and die. Nothing more to the matter.
Logan's proposal? This scene was so special in the book. The castle of ice cream with his promise of love and even though he couldn't buy her a castle he could treat her like a princess. We all knew it wouldn't happen in the movie because they turned him into a butchers son instead of having the pharmacy with the ice cream parlor. So instead we get a sad proposal at Tom's funeral. Though it was sweet it doesn't pull at your heart the way the book did.
Troy. His ghost haunts farthy. Grandma Jillian is haunted by him thinking he blames her and has come back to haunt her. There's no rye whiskey to spook the staff with ghost stories or the sounds of music coming from the piano in the dead of night. There was nothing besides a weird dream to make heaven wander into the maze to his cabin. No finding it set up like a shrine to troy. There were no new toys being made to make her questions who could be living in the house and following this person down into the tunnels to force them to show themselves. Instead he appears in the maze and calls her name. The relief of him being alive shadowing reality of her being a married women now.
Drake who is about 5 in the books looks older and doesn't have the fire engine he held so dear. No heartbreaking scene of the young boy running to his parents room calling out for them only to learn they will never return.
Tony comes to her in a drunken memory and tries to have his way with her. The butler Curtis doesn't find him passed out in the nightgown and worry about his sanity.
The trial was done well in my opinion. They rushed it in order to have enough time for it but they still kept all the information in it and only delivered it in a different way. It was a little weird to have heaven tell Fanny to say that Randal was the father because she never told her to lie but rather just not admit that it is Logan's.
Fallen Hearts-the good and bad
mweaver-334741 September 2019
Good
Court Case scene was excellent
Actress playing Fanny was cast very well
Nice to see Grandpa Toby finally
Final scenes with Heaven and Fanny was sweet
Bad Farthy wedding reception should have been a huge outdoor affair Circus scene/Tom' death should have ended the last movie Troy's return was done incorrectly and should have included Jillian believing he was a ghost In the book, Heaven told Logan that Tony was her father when she fled Farthy
All and all, as usual too rushed
Bad Farthy wedding reception should have been a huge outdoor affair Circus scene/Tom' death should have ended the last movie Troy's return was done incorrectly and should have included Jillian believing he was a ghost In the book, Heaven told Logan that Tony was her father when she fled Farthy
All and all, as usual too rushed
Like watching a car crash
mgconlan-112 August 2019
Watcing the third installment of Lifetime's complete adaptation of V. C. Andrews' (and Andrew Neiderman's) Casteel family saga, "Fallen Hearts," is like watching a car crash: you're at once sickened by the situation and revolted at yourself for being gripped by it and unable to turn yourself away. As the writers pile on insanely melodramatic situation on top of insanely melodramatic situation, the actors mostly seem to forget everything they've ever learned about acting: one can almost sense them thinking, "Get my line out ... hit my mark ... turn to the person I'm supposed to be talking to ... get my line out and hit my mark again." "Fallen Hearts" has one genuinely good performance: Jessica Clement as Fanny Casteel, alone among the people in this movie, has found a way to reconcile the aspects of a V. C. Andrews character: her sexuality, her sleaziness, her greed and the traumas she's lived with all her life that have made her that way and shaped her evil. Other than that, the acting in this movie is at a strictly professional level, not downright bad but not particularly good either.
I've long had a theory that actor-directors seem to have a unique gift in getting understated performances out of their casts - even actor-directors who as actors were unmitigated hams, like Erich von Stroheim and Orson Welles. Among modern-day (albeit getting on in years) actor-directors I've especially liked Clint Eastwood and Robert Redford for not only selecting compelling stories to film for their movies in which they direct but don't act (and sometimes, like Redford's "The Horse Whisperer," in which they direct and do act) but for getting their actors to play in subtle and understated ways. Alas, either Jason Priestley doesn't have the chops in terms of working with fellow actors Eastwood and Redford do or - as I suspect - he realized early on in this project that a V. C. Andrews/Andrew Neiderman story requires a certain amount of scenery-chewing and that trying to get understated performances from his cast would have only made the movie seem even sillier.
No doubt there's still an audience for this sort of Southern-fried Gothic melodrama - Lifetime's first forays into Andrewsiana, "Flowers in the Attic" (based on Andrews' 1979 debut novel) and the sequel "Petals in the Wind" were huge ratings winners for them - but I've found myself alternately infuriated by the movies in the Casteel sequence and drawn to them in a sick fascination, wondering just how low these storytellers can go and how many plot contrivances they can stick on top of each other until Verdi's notoriously nonsensical opera "Il Trovatore" looks like cinema verité by comparison.
I've long had a theory that actor-directors seem to have a unique gift in getting understated performances out of their casts - even actor-directors who as actors were unmitigated hams, like Erich von Stroheim and Orson Welles. Among modern-day (albeit getting on in years) actor-directors I've especially liked Clint Eastwood and Robert Redford for not only selecting compelling stories to film for their movies in which they direct but don't act (and sometimes, like Redford's "The Horse Whisperer," in which they direct and do act) but for getting their actors to play in subtle and understated ways. Alas, either Jason Priestley doesn't have the chops in terms of working with fellow actors Eastwood and Redford do or - as I suspect - he realized early on in this project that a V. C. Andrews/Andrew Neiderman story requires a certain amount of scenery-chewing and that trying to get understated performances from his cast would have only made the movie seem even sillier.
No doubt there's still an audience for this sort of Southern-fried Gothic melodrama - Lifetime's first forays into Andrewsiana, "Flowers in the Attic" (based on Andrews' 1979 debut novel) and the sequel "Petals in the Wind" were huge ratings winners for them - but I've found myself alternately infuriated by the movies in the Casteel sequence and drawn to them in a sick fascination, wondering just how low these storytellers can go and how many plot contrivances they can stick on top of each other until Verdi's notoriously nonsensical opera "Il Trovatore" looks like cinema verité by comparison.
We demand a redo.. from someone else!
daysafterdaze27 November 2019
I laughed out loud at grandpa suddenly existing.
He wasn't in the first movie. Not even mentioned.
He wasn't in the second movie- and there was that scene where Heaven has a fever in her old cabin that is clearly abandoned- with no grandpa in sight.
I skipped through the rest of the movie and called it quits halfway through. It was too terrible.
Lifetime, please keep your hands off any further book adaptations.
He wasn't in the first movie. Not even mentioned.
He wasn't in the second movie- and there was that scene where Heaven has a fever in her old cabin that is clearly abandoned- with no grandpa in sight.
I skipped through the rest of the movie and called it quits halfway through. It was too terrible.
Lifetime, please keep your hands off any further book adaptations.
My mistake
bevo-1367815 October 2021
What a great series
rs-8961912 August 2019
This whole T.V. Series is a TRAIN CRASH, ONE MOVIE AFTER ANOTHER!!!
mistyboogieboo20 June 2020
This was such a good book. The writers on this movies series really disgraced V.C. Andrews and all she accomplished before her death. I truly hope someone is willing to read all of her books in this series and creates a new movie series that is identical for the most part to the books. I would really love to see this series come to life the way V.C. Andrews wrote it.
rushed soap
SnoopyStyle17 May 2020
Heaven (Annalise Basso) is the new teacher back home. She discovers that Luke had sold his children and she vows revenge. Logan Stonewall still has a crush on her. Tom is now a clown in the circus. Luke's carelessness lets the lion escape and Tom gets eaten. Heaven blames herself. Fanny wants her daughter back from the Reverend and somehow blames Heaven. After her marriage to Logan, she reluctantly accepts a party invitation from Tony (Jason Priestley) despite still blaming him for raping her mother. Jillian (Kelly Rutherford) has deteriorated further. Tony makes various offers and Troy is alive.
This franchise really rushes through its plot. When you throw in a lion, you get what you expect. This is also the first post V. C. Andrews book. There is an aspect of hate-watching to this. It's bad soap but it's still sudsy. I'm waiting for the evil twin. These books may be better as a longer running TV soap series.
This franchise really rushes through its plot. When you throw in a lion, you get what you expect. This is also the first post V. C. Andrews book. There is an aspect of hate-watching to this. It's bad soap but it's still sudsy. I'm waiting for the evil twin. These books may be better as a longer running TV soap series.
Absolute rubbish
dasopatis-5722226 September 2020
Why can't they find decent actors?
shannonlong6362 August 2020
Not all the actors are terrible. Annalise Basso and Jason Priestly are fine but many are so over the top (Fanny and the Reverend in particular) it just ruins the whole movie. Is it really that hard to find decent actors these days?
cringe worthy
simmonsann7 November 2021
Wow! and WTF?
nemman6326 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Wow! And WTF?
As a non book reader of this series I was completely bewildered through much of this 3rd episode. Starting right off the bat in the opening scene.
"Wow! It is sweet old grandpa looking like a retired college professor, having breakfast with Heaven!" Wait, WTF? Grandfather? Where has he been, and why was he MIA through all of the horrific times?
Why was he never even mentioned?
"But it is sweet that he still thinks his beloved wife is still alive and with him!" Wait the same beloved grandmother who was literally stressed and worked to death trying to raise all the kids all be herself in ABJECT POVERTY, because her son was a drunken good for nothing, abusive father and husband? That was his beloved wife? WTF? Where was he then or at the funeral?
I guess I will never know.
But boy he looks like he lived a much better and more comfortable life than his late wife did.
Then heaven gets angry that "Luke" isn't coming to her wedding. I rack my brain trying to remember who Luke is.
Heaven throws out a hint by casually declaring he was the man that raped her.
Well, if you count statutory rape there is Cal and Troy who raped her, but I don't remember anyone else even having sex with her?
I pause movie and check IMBD and find out Luke it her Pa. I don't ever remember any mention of him raping her. WTF? Ok maybe she is just now remembering... but then later when she finds out Tony manipulated things to get her away from her "rapist" she hates tony. How could he have separated her from her beloved Pa? WTF?
It was around that time, and the ridiculous shenanigans with Troy that I just stopped trying to make sense of any of it and just go along for the ride. (Troy loved her so much that he put her through the incredible trauma and guilt of her thinking he killed himself over her, but the seeing her again made him decide to hell with all that and doing the honorable thing of letting her go and live her life, and decided some good ole sex was in order... WTF?
I actually thought Episode 1 was pretty decent for this type of offering, but it went downhill in the 2nd one, and this one just went completely off the rails.
As a non book reader of this series I was completely bewildered through much of this 3rd episode. Starting right off the bat in the opening scene.
"Wow! It is sweet old grandpa looking like a retired college professor, having breakfast with Heaven!" Wait, WTF? Grandfather? Where has he been, and why was he MIA through all of the horrific times?
Why was he never even mentioned?
"But it is sweet that he still thinks his beloved wife is still alive and with him!" Wait the same beloved grandmother who was literally stressed and worked to death trying to raise all the kids all be herself in ABJECT POVERTY, because her son was a drunken good for nothing, abusive father and husband? That was his beloved wife? WTF? Where was he then or at the funeral?
I guess I will never know.
But boy he looks like he lived a much better and more comfortable life than his late wife did.
Then heaven gets angry that "Luke" isn't coming to her wedding. I rack my brain trying to remember who Luke is.
Heaven throws out a hint by casually declaring he was the man that raped her.
Well, if you count statutory rape there is Cal and Troy who raped her, but I don't remember anyone else even having sex with her?
I pause movie and check IMBD and find out Luke it her Pa. I don't ever remember any mention of him raping her. WTF? Ok maybe she is just now remembering... but then later when she finds out Tony manipulated things to get her away from her "rapist" she hates tony. How could he have separated her from her beloved Pa? WTF?
It was around that time, and the ridiculous shenanigans with Troy that I just stopped trying to make sense of any of it and just go along for the ride. (Troy loved her so much that he put her through the incredible trauma and guilt of her thinking he killed himself over her, but the seeing her again made him decide to hell with all that and doing the honorable thing of letting her go and live her life, and decided some good ole sex was in order... WTF?
I actually thought Episode 1 was pretty decent for this type of offering, but it went downhill in the 2nd one, and this one just went completely off the rails.
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