Places in the Heart is a 1984 American drama film written and directed by Robert Benton about a U.S. Depression-era Texas widow who tries to save the family farm with the help of a blind white man and a poor black man.

It is 1935 and Waxahachie, Texas is a small, segregated town in the midst of a depression. One afternoon the local sheriff, Royce Spalding, goes to investigate trouble at the rail yards. He dies after being accidentally shot by a young black boy, Wylie. Local white vigilantes tie Wylie to a truck and drag his body through town before hanging him from a tree.

The sheriff's widow, Edna Spalding, is left to raise her children alone and maintain the family farm. The bank has a note on the farm, and the price for cotton is plummeting. The local banker, Mr. Denby, suggests that she sell the farm as he doesn't see how she can afford to make the loan payments.

A drifter and handyman, a black man by the name of Moses, appears at her door one night, asking for work. He offers to plant cotton on all her acres and cites his experience. Edna declines to hire him but offers him a meal and sends him on his way. The next morning, she sees him voluntarily chopping wood in her yard. She offers to make him breakfast on the condition that he leaves. Moses steals some of her silver spoons and leaves. When the police capture Moses with her stolen silver and bring him back to confirm the theft, Edna says she hired him.

The next day, Edna visits Mr. Denby to relay her decision not to sell the farm. He unloads his blind brother-in-law, Will, on Edna, compelling her to take him in as a paid lodger. Will is slow to warm up to her children, but they eventually become close and he rescues her daughter Possum during a tornado. Moses helps Edna's son Frank find his way home during the tornado.

Edna realizes she cannot make the next payment even if she sells all her cotton. The bank declines Edna's request for relief, but she learns of an Ellis County contest: a $100 cash prize to the farmer who produces the first bale of cotton for market each season. Edna realizes the prize money plus the proceeds from the sale of her cotton would be enough to allow her to keep the farm. Edna knows she will need more pickers, and Moses agrees to help her find the help so they can harvest the cotton on time.

Their efforts pay off as Edna and Moses find themselves first in line at the wholesaler with the season's first bale of cotton. Moses carefully coaches Edna on how to negotiate with the buyer, and as a result he is unable to cheat her. That night, Moses is accosted by Ku Klux Klan members and savagely beaten. Will, who recognizes all the assailants' voices as local white men, confronts and identifies them one by one; they all run off. Moses realizes he will have to leave the farm because of possible future attacks.

The story ends with the community in prayer. Communion is passed among the assembled congregants at the church, hand to hand and mouth to mouth, between both the living and the deceased. The last line of the film is spoken by Wylie to Royce Spalding, "Peace of God”. The film closes with all the characters gathered in church singing in unison. 1

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