Charlie's War is the story of Charlotte Lewis, a woman who is experiencing serious emotional and mental turmoil brought about by nightmares of increasing intensity. In the dreams, she is a young girl, and she runs from unknown terrors. Trying to understand her troubling dreams, Charlotte revisits part of her childhood, which comes back to her in a series of impressionistic memories. Charlie, her sister, Jobie, and her mother move in with her grandmother. It is 1944, and World War II rages in Europe and the Far East. Though Grandma's farm seems to be a peaceful refuge, there is an undercurrent of fear and brooding menace in their surroundings.

Olympia Dukakis was in Nashville for only two weeks to do her scenes.

Anachronisms: There is a 50-star US flag at the school despite there being only 48 states at the time.