In this strange film, Jill Maddox is a middle-aged woman with heart problems. When she is rushed to the hospital after a donor's heart becomes available, she has a transplant. The operation is a success, and Jill has a new lease on life. The balance of the film is an exploration of the circumstances of how Jill becomes estranged from her daughter Amanda.

When Jill receives the new ticker, she is, in effect, getting a used part. In this case, she senses a weird connection with her donor, a young man who lived on the wild side and died in a motorcycle crash. Jill now becomes a biking enthusiast, a pool shark, listens to rap music, and wears mini skirts.

The daughter who was a devoted caretaker to her mom when her heart was failing now is resentful of Jill's new lease on life. A gifted musician, Amanda now abandons her goal studying violin at conservatory. In the film, Amanda appears to be 30 or older, yet she still lives at home and never entertains the notion of moving out and living on her own. Jill participates in a support group with other transplant recipients. But it is Amanda who is in need of therapy due to her co-dependency issues.

When Jill decides to visit the family of the donor in Rhode Island, she is welcomed as a member of the family. Yet once again, Amanda feels slighted and distances herself even farther from her mother. In the most preposterous artistic choice, the filmmakers tried to turn the experience into an uplifting Christmas film at the end!

There was little internal logic in the workings of "Heart of a Stranger." It was never believable that Jill was receiving a psychic message from Matt the donor. A character named Dr. Emil suggested that there was Chinese "chi" energy or the Japanese vibrations of "ti." Concurrently, the filmmakers were straining to make palatable the theme of the mother-daughter bonding in the sentimental ending. But the rift between Jill and Amanda was so great that the Jill's video message, the Christmas tree, and the prospect of Amanda playing violin at Jill's restaurant by the sea were never credible.

***SPOILERS*** It's when middle age single mom Jill Maddopx, Jean Seymour, got her long awaited heart transplant that her life took a dramatic and total change. Sure the transplant save Jill's life but it also change her personality where she became a hard drinking junk food eating party girl, dressing up in tight mini skirts, who changed her love for classical to country & western and rap music.

All this behavior on Jill's part turns her daughter Amanda, Maggie Lawson, into an almost basket case with her mom acting as if she's her spoiled kid sister. Amanda who was on her way to became a classical violinist dropped out of the New England Musical Conservatory to work at places, that play country & western music, that her now born again mother went to visit with her boyfriends who for the most part were young enough to be her sons! Seeing that both her as well as her daughters lives are completely going to pot Jill finally made an effort to track down the person who's heart she received in her transplant operation. That's in order for Jill to come to terms to what that operation did both to her and those, in how it changed Jill's personality, that she loved.

It's then that Jill , through the internet, finds a news article of a 22 year old biker-Matt LaSalle-who was killed in a traffic accident in Road Island, Jill lived in neighboring Massachusetts, just 24 hours before she received her heart. It's when Jill together with a very reluctant Amanda, who had just about had it with her mothers wild antics, went to visit the LaSalle family that she finally realized that her hunch that she was implanted with Matt's heart was right! It took a while for the news to settle in but Jill started to realize that she can't lead the wild and dangerous life that Matt did without jeopardizing, as well as alienating, her daughters as well as her friends relationships and finally did the right thing! Got back, as hard as it was, to being the person she was before she got a new lease on life: "The Heart of a Stranger"!

P.S The made for TV movie "Heart of a Stranger" is based on the true story of heart transplant recipient Claire Sylvia. It was Claire who got a heart transplant from an 18 year old hard drinking and wild living party guy who killed himself riding his motorbike at speeds of some 100MPH into an oncoming truck. In what's called cellular memory Claire took on the characteristics of the person who's heart she received that almost caused her to end up, by taking on his lifestyle, the same way that he did. There's also a really touching and heart-felt "New Twilight Zone" episode that's very similar to both the movie "Heart of a Stranger" and the Caire Sylvia book that its based on called "Appointment on route 17" staring Paul La Mat.

Jane Seymour takes on an interesting role in this film. However, I'm not so sure that the story was so odd, or even feasible for that matter. Jane Seymour plays a woman who gets a heart transplant. After the transplant, she starts behaving like a twenty year old woman, and in doing so drives a wedge between her daughter and herself. She attributes this outlandish behavior to her new heart, and goes on a painstaking search to find out who the donor is. However, her behavior coincides with a typical middle aged woman who refuses to get old, has a midlife crisis, and acts like a young woman. So I think the plot was somewhat stretched. Besides that it was a watchable movie.