"My mother lived in one world. I was always looking for another." These words, narrated by ten-year-old Evan Rachel Wood in the beginning of the movie, describe her character well. Evan plays the main character, Harriet Frankovitz, a headstrong, quick-witted girl with an overwhelmingly active imagination.

Digging to China is one among the many less than practical ideas of Harriet's. Another is volunteering to medical experiments for the aliens that, according to National Enquirer, are supposed to land while Harriet is in school. To that end, she tries to attract the aliens waving a flashlight on her school's field and talk to them in their own language. For me, the idea and Harriet's execution of it are most endearing, but such uniquely peculiar ideas don't make her popular among the other children.

Harriet lives in a modest cottage village run by her alcoholic mother, who, while being basically caring of Harriet, can only be bothered to do the minimum of looking after her. With the last member of the family being her big sister whose sole interest appears to be a different male companion each night, the extroverted Harriet is lonely and starved for somebody to talk to.

As mentally-disabled Ricky (Kevin Bacon) arrives with his elderly mother, Harriet quickly befriends him. The two misfits soon become close, and the deepening bond of the two misfits is regarded by some worry by mothers of both. Some say the rest of the movie is easy to predict from this point on: Ricky lacks the judgement to avoid participating in Harriet's wild ideas, and Harriet's parents worry of Ricky's possible sexual intentions – of which he's hardly capable of – toward their little girl. In the end, Ricky must go, but the audience has learnt a lesson of friendship.

I, too, wouldn't praise the plot as full of surprises. However, that is the only and a minor problem next to the many things the movie gets right. All actor performances are good. Kevin Bacon's interpretation of the disabled Ricky is the most difficult to judge. Clichéd and overacted, or convincing and sympathetic? Myself, I liked it well enough.

The easiest to judge is Evan's excellent acting. It would be hard for me to imagine this movie with anybody else in her place. Energetic, photogenic and likeable from the very first seconds of the movie, Evan is the definite star of this film. If you remember Evan's role as Tracy in the movie Thirteen, you probably have certain impression of what the actress behind Tracy's violently intense, sensual role might be like. While Evan's character in Digging to China is far more subdued, not to mention younger, I think I can still see many similarities between the younger and the older Evan.

Whatever the other strengths or weaknesses of the movie might be, when I think back, I see in my mind's eye Evan jumping up and down and speaking alien to the clear blue sky; or Evan holding her innocent wedding ceremony in a river with Ricky; or Evan ... well, you get the idea. With such sweet after taste, I can but highly recommend Digging to China.