Cabrini (2024)

Cristiana Dell'Anna delivers strongly here as the eponymous nun determined to set up a network of orphanages in China to help the sick and impoverished children there. Her persistent hassling of the Vatican for permission - and funds - has finally wound them up to the point where she is invited to Rome to be finally told no. Even there, though, she's sticking to her guns and after a persuasive audience with Pope Leo XIII (Giancarlo Giannini) manages to get permission to prove her worth - only in New York! To it's slum and run-down Five Points district she is sent and what now begins is an adventure that tests her very mettle as the, at best indifferent, attitude of the Archbishop (David Morse) is more concerned with appeasing the Mayor (John Lithgow) than facilitating her wishes for profound change. It's curious that in a city founded by immigrants there existed such a polarity of the Italian, the Jewish and Irish communities offering little, if any, tolerance of the other. Cabrini realises that neither her religion nor her status as a nun is going to help her - she is going to have to recruit local urchins and fight for every scrap of progress. It's history, so we do know what ultimately happens but Alejandro Monteverde has produced a classy looking portrait that still imbues enough jeopardy into the proceedings as she struggles. Her single-minded determination, her bloody-mindedness - all tempered with huge amounts of humanity and decency are well portrayed here. This is a very good looking film, and the narrative also demonstrates clearly the diminished role of women in what purported to be an open and democratic society - American and Italian, and a class system that cared little for those who lived on the wrong side of the tracks. It's a bit long - there are moments that slow the pace down and drag the story, but in the main this is a poignant telling of the story of a woman who was prepared to sacrifice whatever was necessary for those less privileged.