The Homesman

The Homesman is a 2014 FrenchAmerican period drama film set in the 1850s midwest produced and directed by Tommy Lee Jones and cowritten with Kieran Fitzgerald and Wesley Oliver, based on the 1988 novel of the same name by Glendon Swarthout. The film stars Jones and Hilary Swank and also features Meryl Streep, Hailee Steinfeld, John Lithgow, and James Spader.

Mary Bee Cuddy Hilary Swank is a 31yearold spinster from New York, a former teacher who journeyed to the Midwest for more opportunity. She is an active member of the small farming community Loup City, Nebraska Territory, and has significant financial prospects and sizable land ownership. She seems strong and independent, but suffers from depression and isolation after being rejected by several potential husbands for being unattractive and overbearing. She makes dinner for and sings to her neighbor Bob Giffen Evan Jones, but when she proposes, he turns her down and leaves to find a wife back east.After a harsh winter, three women from the community begin to show signs of mental instability due to the hardships they have faced. Arabella Sours Grace Gummer has lost three children to diphtheria, Theoline Belknapp Miranda Otto is forced to kill her own child after a poor harvest puts her family at risk of starvation, and Gro Svendsen Sonja Richter, a Danish immigrant, is shown to be in a mutually abusive relationship with her husband and suffers a breakdown after her mother dies. Reverend Dowd John Lithgow calls upon one of their husbands to escort the women eastward to a church in Hebron, Iowa that cares for the mentally ill. Unsatisfied with any of the mens potential, Mary Bee volunteers for the task alone, and Dowd reluctantly agrees. ........

Source: Wikipedia