Mermaid (DVD)(2000)

A child's letter to heaven gets an unexpected response in this touching family drama, inspired by actual incidents. Desi is a five-year-old girl who has become inconsolable after the death of her father. Desi's mother, Rhonda, isn't sure what to do for her troubled daughter and when the girl tells her mother she wants to write her father a last letter and attach it to a balloon so it will be carried to heaven, Rhonda agrees it's a good idea. Desi and Rhonda send out the balloon, which is carried by the winds to a small community known as Mermaid. There, a man named Wade MacKinnon finds the balloon, with the letter attached. After reading the message, Wade and his family decide to answer the letter, as if their missive had been written by Desi's late father. Mermaid stars Samantha Mathis, Ellen Burstyn, Jodelle Ferland, and David Kaye.