After watching Rails & Ties, I couldn't help but feel the film could've and should've been better. Rails & Ties marks the directorial debut of Alison Eastwood (daughter of Clint), and she should be applauded for taking on such difficult material for her debut behind the camera. While I found the first 35 minutes of the film moving and emotionally gripping, not long after that, the plot sunk into a series of melodramatic clichés found in bad television movies.

Tom Stark (Kevin Bacon) is a railroad engineer who doesn't just love his work; it seems to be the thing that defines him as a person. As the film opens, Tom is told he can take a day off to spend time with his wife Megan (Marcia Gay Harden), who has cancer. Tom just wants to work, and boards his beloved train for his shift.

It's clear early on that Tom is emotionally unavailable to his wife. In her opening scene, Megan, a nurse at the local hospital, is there to see her own doctor all alone. She asks him how much time she has left, and the answer leaves her crying in the hallway. We soon learn that even though she and Tom have been married for years, he hasn't been emotionally available to her for a long time. His passion lies with trains. At work, he's behind the throttle. At home, he tinkers with an elaborate train set in his garage.

Meanwhile, 11-year-old Davey Danner (Miles Heizer) is looking after his mother (Bonnie Root), who is clearly mentally ill. Today though, Davey is thrilled. His mother has announced that she is going to take him to see his favorite train. When the principal calls, Davey tells him that his mother has died. Mom takes Davey to the train crossing, pulls on to the tracks as Tom's train is getting closer, and passes out. Doing what he believes is by the book, Tom decides to keep going to avoid derailment. Davey escapes, but his mother is killed instantly.

"He didn't even try to stop!" Davey says over and over again. Rightly perhaps, he blames Tom for his mother's death. Tom remains strangely distant and convinced the hearing will bring vindication and allow him to get back behind the throttle of his beloved train. Even as he sits on a ten-day suspension, he tells his dying wife he can't go with her to San Francisco because he has to be around until he finds out the results of the hearing.

There are a couple more scenes that build a nice, emotional story around Tom, Megan, and young Davey. Then inexplicably, the script (by Micky Levy) veers off into melodramatic, unbelievable territory. While it's totally understandable Davey would find conditions at his foster home so unlivable that he would run away, it is way too easy for him to locate Tom Stark. While it is possible as a viewer to stretch reality a bit to believe that such a young boy would find the Starks, believing that he would be able to stay there long enough for them to begin to love each other is totally unrealistic.