Religious films come in all shapes and sizes. Sometimes, they take place in the past and have men and women in robes and sandals.  Other times, they are set in a modern-day context. Cabrini, though, is a period piece set in the early 19th century. As a Catholic myself, I was fascinated by this story of the patron Saint of immigrants.  I was a bit familiar with St Patrick, the Irish Saint, but not this woman. 

Francesca Cabrini (Cristiana Del’anna) is a young nun who runs an orphanage in Italy. She believes she’s meant for greater things, so she goes to Rome to approach the Cardinal about trying to get funding to set up orphanages in China. After getting turned down by him, she insists on getting a no from His Excellency Pope Leo XIII himself. Instead, he agrees with her ideas but instead sends her to the United States, specifically New York City, to do her good work there instead. She reluctantly agrees and embarks on an arduous journey. 

New York at this time, specifically the Five Points where this woman is going, is dirty and filled with ramshackle homes and buildings. She had a hard time reaching Father Morrelli her contact once she arrived in New York City, so she enlists the help of a woman of the night Vittoria  (Ramona Maggiora Vergano) to find lodging for herself and her fellow nuns instead. Eventually, she meets ArchBishop Cortigan (David Morse), and he reluctantly helps her find a location for her orphanage despite the local priest in the area. He didn’t want her around and warned her of being there. She had a rough beginning but finally started to do what she wanted to do to save the children and homeless in the Five Points area of New York City. This was also depicted very well in the 2001 film The Gangs of New York by film legendary Martin Scorsese.

This woman is determined to help children and give them a place to live, feed them, and give them health care. The problem is that she and most of them are Italian and New York City at this time in history is run by the Irish. Men and women in positions of power like mayor and health inspector and so forth. She is very stubborn and goes to the ArchBishop continuously, but even he has his limits, and he finally has enough of this woman bucking his authority. She ends up finding a new friend, namely Calloway (Jeremy Bobb), who is a writer for the newspaper in New York City at this time. He ends up being a big help to her. They also upset the apple cart a bit as well.

A key moment in the film I thought that was very powerful between Cabrini and the Mayor at the time Gould played by John Lithgow was this one The Mayor-i” t’s a very shame your a woman, you would have made a great man”  Cabrini-” Oh no men couldn’t do what women do”  This was a strong moment in the story of this woman and her journey to help feed and house children. She found ways to get people to believe in her cause even when they didn’t want to or if they had their agendas.  That was the power of this woman. She was very inspirational.

There are technical aspects of this film that helped make it more effective in getting its story across. The production design and sets help the film look the part of when it took place. The early nineteenth-century New York City came to life in this film. Along with the production design, the costumes helped make the characters look the part of people that existed at that time as well. Various religious garb, jackets, hats, and other forms of clothing had the entire cast fitting in during the filming of this movie. I was completely invested in the film with these two aspects of behind-the-scenes production. This was terrific stuff in the overall context of this movie.

This film has some big-name actors like the ones I’ve already mentioned but it’s the star of the film that was a revelation to me. Christina Dell’Anna as the title character held her own amidst some very good actors like Lithgow, Morse, and Bobb. She had to command the screen. This character has a specific way about her so she had to play her as such. It didn’t matter who she was acting opposite of, she made every scene her own. She had very emotional stuff to do in this film and made me care about her, her mission, and her journey.  She is an actress to watch moving forward.

As a somewhat Christian myself I was very glad I had the opportunity to watch a film about a catholic Saint I hadn’t heard about. My own religious journey has been up and down throughout my life but watching this movie gave me a lot of faith in religion once again. The performances by the entire cast were very good with Del’Anna being an absolute revelation to me. She controlled every scene she was in and that’s saying a lot. The overall story was quite inspirational to me and the production design and costumes made me believe in that story because of how everything looked. The director is Alejandro Gomez Monteverde, who also co-wrote the film with Rod Barr. They captured this story perfectly from what I was able to see. 

4 stars

Dan Skip Allen