Friday, April 1, 2011

For Your Lenten Friday Night at the Movies IV

It's roughly the midpoint of Lent. Unlike last Friday, when we were celebrating a Solemnity, we are back to abstaining from meat today. But no worries. I've always been fond of fish tacos, so that is what's on the menu at Casa del Weathers tonight. And there is beer to go with them, for the adults anyway, so all is well.

Tonight's feature presentation is Lilies of the Field starring Sidney Poitier. Poitier won the Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role for this film in 1964. I never saw it though because I was a baby in swaddling clothes around that time.

But I've always liked Poitier's work. For example:  Blackboard Jungle, The Bedford Incident, and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. I also liked him in To Sir with Love and They Call Me MISTER Tibbs. Come to think of it, I don't think there is a single movie I've seen him in that I did not like.

So what is this film about? Based on a true story that was fictionalized as a novel by William Edmund Barret, the story is about one Homer Smith and a group of nuns he stumbles upon.  Out of luck, and out of work, he stops to put some water in his radiator at a farm in Arizona while heading westward to find construction work. The farm just happens to be run by a gaggle of transplanted East German nuns from the Sisters of Walburga.

As it turns out, this is a match made in heaven and brought together on earth. Homer isn't to sure about all this, bun the nuns are. Have a look at the first 10 minutes (and prepare to be sucked in for the whole enchilada).



Are you humming the tune "Amen" yet? Head to your usual video outlets, or watch this on You Tube or over at Gloria.tv in its entirety.