CABRINI - Mark Reviews Movies

Cabrini, Angel Studios

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Review by Mark Dujsik | March 7, 2024

"A hundred years from now," an archbishop tells Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini (Cristiana Dell'Anna) when she tells him of yet another ambitious plan to help the poor, "these problems will still exist." The man is no prophet, of course, but simply a pragmatist—and, sadly, a correct one, at that. Cabrini, which follows the work of the eponymous nun to bring shelter and comfort to the ignored and oppressed of New York City in the late 1800s, is as much a story about now as it is about then.

Here, on a small scale, is a story of the immigrant experience in the United States. Cabrini is one, a nun who arrives in New York with a blessing from the Pope to take over an orphanage in a particularly rough and impoverished neighborhood with her fellow religious sisters.

The people for whom she cares, mostly children at first, are mainly Italian migrants like her, who arrived in this country with promises of professional and personal success but only found discrimination, poverty, sickness, and, too often, death. The streets were supposed to be paved with gold, according to the rumors and legends of the country's prosperity. Instead, they're "tombs for dreams," as the film's Cabrini notes.

The film, written by Rod Barr and directed by Alejandro Monteverde, is as much about the social climate, the political machinations, and the inherently prejudicial systems of so many institutions in the United States as it as about Cabrini. It's a stronger story for that—not only because it approaches intrinsically faith-based material with its feet completely planted in the real world, but also because it allows the echoes of the past to reverberate into the present.

At the point of history in this story, it's Italian immigrants who are demeaned, exploited, dehumanized, and considered less than "natural" Americans or even, in some cases, human. It's easy to understand what drew Monteverde to Cabrini's story, considering that, today, another group is regularly perceived and treated in a similar manner—and has been for decades. The director, an immigrant from Mexico and a naturalized U.S. citizen, likely knows something specific about that.

As a result, there's a real sense of passion to the storytelling here, which ignores most biographical conventions and simply observes its main subject in the process of her good works. They are very good works, indeed, which have become the origin of a worldwide network of hospitals, schools, and other organizations dedicated to social services. After the events depicted here, Cabrini would become the first Catholic saint who was a citizen of the United States, and it's little wonder the film can end with film and photographs of mass gatherings celebrating the event of her canonization. It's more than national pride. Her life is a testimony to the American ideal that we are one, regardless of any sort of background that some would insist to be worthy of exclusion.

That the film approaches all of these ideas and ideals, while also serving as a study of Cabrini's devotion to those outcast by society and determination to make life better for everyone she encounters and beyond, is to its credit. Again, this isn't some generic biography, in which a subject's entire life is covered and broadly summarized. We get a flashback or two to Cabrini's childhood, surviving almost drowning and overhearing a doctor tell her mother that this girl won't be capable of much because of her health. Otherwise, the story lives from moment to moment, as the nun dreams of missionary work, hits some financial or political obstacle, and realizes she'll have to be a bit creative to get around that barricade.

Failure or giving up isn't an option Cabrini, who stares in the faces of priests, archbishops, cardinals, and even the Pope and tells these men that she isn't quitting—not because of money, not because of any orders from higher-ups, not because the work is too hard, not because no one else has been able to do it, certainly not because they might believe a woman isn't capable of or meant to be doing such things. Monteverde may frame his star in saintly close-ups and tableaus that possess the air of religious iconography (Long shots of some moment where the light shines upon her and her deeds in painterly symmetry). Dell'Anna's performance, though, is grounded in that need for Cabrini to prove herself and the necessity of her mission, while making her quite frail and vulnerable whenever she has time to herself.

The barriers are significant. People are sick and dying from assorted diseases. Orphaned children are living in sewers. Regular people spew epithets or become violent, even when it's a nun standing in front of them. Archbishop Corrigan (David Morse), the head of the area where Cabrini serves for the Catholic Church, wants Cabrini to go back to Italy before she arrives, and only a letter from Pope Leo XIII (Giancarlo Giannini) barely changes his mind.

Those two men become allies (with a lot of convincing), as does a local reporter (played by Jeremy Bobb) who helps Cabrini get around the archbishop order that she not seek aid from "ordinary Americans." Eventually, her work attracts the attention of Mayor Gould (John Lithgow), who believes everyone has a certain place and that the Italian immigrants belong in the slums.

Those words and beliefs haven't stopped, of course, although the targets of them have changed. Cabrini makes that clear while also highlighting an inspirational example of goodness, decency, and dedication in the face of such—sadly far too common—inhumane treatment of fellow human beings.

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