Welcome Home (1989 film)

A very sick man is rescued and taken somewhere in Cambodia, close to the border with Vietnam, where he receives help. The man is US Air Force officer Jake Robbins, who had been shot down while in a combat mission in Vietnam and then made a prisoner of war. Jake managed to escape but then realizes that it is really dangerous to leave the jungle, so he decides to hide there. Some years later he marries a local woman and has two children. Since he had been reported missing and presumed dead, his American wife, Sarah, mourned him and eventually moved on with her life and remarried. Back in Cambodia, Jake gets very sick and the US government manages to take him to Cambodia, but without his new family. The US military tells him that he had been declared missing in action years earlier and that all of his family in America had been informed about it. In addition, the US military tells him that he can go back home in America, but that he has to maintain a low profile since the topic of MIA is very complicated. Jake agrees but under the condition that his new family will be allowed to join him later in America. Jake returns home without telling anyone back home. Jake's reappearance is a blessing for his father, Harry, who tells him that Sarah remarried and that he has a son that was born several months after he left for Vietnam, something that Jake did not know. Jake's return is a mixed blessing for Sarah. Initially, the son sees Jake as a threat to his family, and does not want to do anything with him. Overwhelmed at home, Jake decides to find out where his Southeast Asian wife and children are. He leaves for Cambodia and eventually finds out that his wife had died and his children were in a refugee camp. Jake finds his children and takes them to America to live with him and his father. Jake's son has a change of heart and decides to go visit Jake, his half brother and sister and embrace them.

Filming took place in July–August 1988 in Vermont, Toronto and Kingston.^[1] Part of the finance came from the Rank Organisation.^[2]

The film was not a box-office success.^[3]

Movie historian Leonard Maltin's TV, Movie & Video Guide gave the picture 2 out of a possible 4 stars, citing it as "tolerably sincere at best, embalmed at worst."^{[citation needed]}