Please welcome new contributor Kyndall Cunningham...
As a churchgoing kid with a fairly good singing voice, choir took up a big chunk of my adolescence. I attended weekly rehearsals, went to my choir mates’ houses to practice and woke up at the crack of dawn on Sunday mornings to perform for the congregation (and God). I had a strong affection for gospel music, but my intense involvement in ministry at such a young age felt deeply uncool at times, if not isolating from the rest of the world. It wasn’t until I picked out Sister Act from my family’s VHS closet one day that I saw that part of my life tied to pop culture in an exciting way. Needless to say, I began screening the film religiously.
Sorry.
Like a lot of stories about women turning a new leaf, Sister Act begins with a breakup and ends with a love story...
For Deloris Van Cartier (Whoopi Goldberg), it’s a breakup gone wrong. When the Reno lounge singer attempts to dump her married mobster boyfriend (Harvey Keitel), she accidentally sees him shoot a man and immediately becomes his next target as a witness to the crime. She goes to the Reno Police Department where a lieutenant (Bill Nunn) puts her in a convent in a gritty San Francisco neighborhood under the leadership of the Reverend Mother played by an immaculately cast (sorry again) Maggie Smith. There, she struggles to adjust to a modest lifestyle and, after one too many slip-ups, is forced to revamp the church’s strikingly bad, nun-comprised choir as punishment.
Sister Act is most masterful in its blending of genres. It’s a fish-out-of-water comedy backgrounded in crime with musical and dramatic elements that also feels like a buddy film. None of these components or character dynamics feel shoehorned in, particularly the on-the-run aspect that the audience could easily forget once Deloris becomes fully invested in the convent. We’re reminded of the life-threatening stakes throughout the entire film even when Deloris neglects them. Of course, I can't forget to mention Goldberg's comedic chops on full display. Her delivery of Delores' inappropriate outbursts, including her shriek when she first sees herself in the nun uniform and her assertion in front of the women that music is better than sex, make Sister Act a laugh-out-loud comedy.
The integration and placement of musical performances throughout the film is extremely well done in my opinion, as someone who watches a lot of musicals or movies with music in them. I’m not sure who to credit for these choices, considering the original screenplay was penned by Broadway playwright Paul Rudnick but doctored so much that he would only accept credit under the pseudonym Joseph Baker. But whoever’s responsible for limiting the choir’s performances to two short songs and a grand finale found the perfect equilibrium between plot and music for a film clocking in at 100 minutes. We also aren’t forced to hear a solo ballad from Sister Mary Robert (Wendy Makkena), the shy, young nun who discovers her vocal talent (voiced by Andrea Robinson) and becomes less introverted throughout the film.
Lastly, one of the reasons I appreciate the original Sister Act over its more beloved sequel is that it’s interested in a group of people who aren’t obvious cinematic material. Yes, there are American films about nuns, many of them from the ‘40s, ‘50s and ‘60s (The Trouble With Angels is one of my favorites). But a story focused on a group of pious middle-aged and elderly women, as opposed to urban high school students, learning how to sing is a less attractive premise, particularly when you think about the big studio films of the ‘90s. Nevertheless, watching this particular group of women learn from one another and eventually risk their lives for each other still feels like an incredibly unique and groundbreaking depiction in 2019.
Previously in Over & Overs...
- Moonstruck (1987) by Deborah
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) by Lynn
- The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) by Mark
- To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything Julie Newmar (1995) by Chris
- Sugar & Spice (2001) by Spencer
- Marie-Antoinette (2006) by Claudio
- Julie & Julia (2009) by Ginny
- Moonrise Kingdom (2012) by Ginny