On another occasion, Goldberg's adolescent daughter (Erika Anderson) breaks the boycott in favor of a far-more pressing issue - to see a boyfriend.Д¬inematographer Roger Deakins creates a pleasing, high-contrast look to the film. When a white cop unceremoniously kicks out Goldberg and Spacek's white children from an exclusive park, Spacek exacts an apology from the police - but for the humiliation of her children, not Goldberg. When Schultz stays home sick on the day Spacek usually gives Goldberg a ride, however, battle lines are drawn.ДЄlthough most of 'Walk Home' heads down this ready-for-prime-time moral path, director Richard Pearce and screenwriter John Cork uncover some interesting dramatic grays along the way. But she must hide this politically compromising activity from husband Dwight Schultz (and certainly his more bigoted brother, Dylan Baker). Spacek, who obviously needs her maid but also comes to appreciate the larger issue, gives her a ride twice a week. So, when blacks refuse to ride the buses rather than endure the indignities of sitting in the back, it means a twice-daily, bruising walk in uncomfortable shoes. Conscientious in her job, she is also deeply committed to political emancipation. Goldberg, who lives on the far side of town with husband Ving Rhames and their children, must take a long bus ride to get to the white neighborhood where she works. Sissy Spacek, as Goldberg's employer, a white housewife who becomes increasingly aware of the social inequities in her own kitchen, also contributes an involving human presence. Their glowing moral triumph by movie's end is a bankable certainty.Д«ut if the fare is familiar, Goldberg's restrained, stoic performance as the maid who must serve her employers and the boycott raises the experience several pegs. The villains (racist cops, bigoted relatives) may huff and puff for most of the movie, but the victims (Goldberg, her family and the black movement) will not be blown over. The social message in 'Walk Home' is unmistakable. It shows - with disarming simplicity - the effect of the famous 1950s Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott on a black housekeeper (Whoopi Goldberg) and the white family that employs her.

Viewed as a made-for-TV movie, 'The Long Walk Home' is a respectably stirring film about the rupturing birth of civil rights in the South.

The long walk home the movie