Dear Frankie

Nine year old Frankie only knows his father through the letters they share. For as long as Frankie can remember, his father has been away on a ship traveling the world. Frankie has learned a great deal of geography and has collected many stamps that his father has sent.

Because Frankie is deaf, and because his mother moves frequently, Frankie has very few friends beyond his home. Certainly his mother and grandmother love him, but there is still something missing from Frankie’s life.

One day, one of Frankie’s classmates brings him news that his father’s ship will be in port soon. This creates something of a problem for Frankie’s mother. All these years, she has been writing the letters to Frankie to cover up that they are on the run from his father. How will she deal with the ship’s arrival without disappointing her son or admitting the lie? She seeks out a man – a man with whom she has no past or future – to hire to serve as Frankie’s father for a day.

This seems a set up for a plot that one might expect to be fairly predictable. In many ways it is. Most (but not all) of the plot I could see coming. But the film is so well done that I just enjoyed watching it play out. I came out of the film far more affected than I had expected to be.

As the story develops in Dear Frankie, Frankie, his mother, and this father-for-hire all get far more than was bargained for. The relationship that develops in the brief encounter is filled with grace.

Part of that grace grows from Frankie’s longing for a father and his ready acceptance of this stranger as the father he has never met. That longing is seen in the letters he writes week after week. Even without ever seeing his father (or even a picture of him), Frankie believes that his father is real and cares for him. He never really asks much of his father; the letters just tell of the things going on in his life. So when this man appears, Frankie is ready to accept whoever he is and understand that this is the love that his father has always had for him.

Another aspect of grace is seen in the relationship between Frankie and his mother. It is to make Frankie feel more complete that she has kept this fabrication going all these years. She has put a good deal of work into this effort, imagining an itinerary for the ship, finding stamps from around the world, and writing these letters with the love that she would wish his father would to have. It turns out to be as much of a reward for her as it is for him. Since Frankie is deaf, the letters are the only way she can hear his voice.

But the key aspect of grace in the film is this hired father. Everything about him resonates grace. He enters the relationship as if he truly belongs there. We get the feeling that for this day, he does not so much act as Frankie’s father as he becomes Frankie’s father. More and more, we come to understand that the things he does do not grow out of some sense of job description, rather they are founded upon love.

As all these expressions of grace interact, we see the many ways that grace begets grace. There is both a grace of giving and a grace of receiving. As each bit of grace is given and received, it rebounds in such a way that all those involved are blessed in the process.

Perhaps that’s why I was more affected by this film than I expected – because this story is a bit of grace that is shared with us. If we receive such grace, we will be blessed.