why couldnt court date Dani?
She’s 14, he’s older, and he knows it’s wrong. The film is explicit that Dani Trant is 14 in the summer of 1957, while Court Foster is the older teen next door. After some playful nights at the swimming hole, Court literally stops himself and tells her she’s “a little girl who doesn’t know what she’s doing,” which is the movie’s way of drawing a hard boundary around the age gap.
Dani does get her first kiss with Court, but the film still frames his stance as “I like you, but you’re too young,” which is echoed in dialogue captured in quote compilations. The scene is there to mark Dani’s coming-of-age, not to green-light a relationship.
why was the dr so rude to the dad at the hospital? That scene always got me. Its like the Dr was so pissed to be woken up and called in to the hospital
The hospital run happens because Dani’s mother, Abigail, falls and is kept for a concussion and toxemia (preeclampsia). That’s a serious, time-sensitive pregnancy complication; brusque, take-charge behavior from the on-call physician is realistic under those circumstances.
The film is set in 1957 rural Louisiana, a time when U.S. medicine was still largely paternalistic—doctors tended to be curt with families and made decisions with minimal discussion, especially in emergencies. That “rudeness” reads today as poor bedside manner, but it matches mid-20th-century norms.
Good movie, by the way.
“There are no atheists in foxholes, eh?”-Keith Jennings from the Omen.

Dani was too young. A tomboyish 14.
Doc had a duty to perform. Matt was getting in the way. He told him so.