Cabrini

Released in the UK to coincide with International Women’s Day, this biopic of Italian nun Francesca Saverio Cabrini, also known as Mother Cabrini (1850-1917), is literally a hagiography. Cabrini, played by Cristiana Dell’Anna, was canonised a saint in 1946, making her the first US citizen to be sanctified. But don’t let the religious angle put you off too much. In fact, the film is reasonably critical of certain members of the clergy who stood in the way of Cabrini’s charitable goals, including Pope Leo XIII (Giancarlo…

Movies about saints tend to invoke notions of the past, when miracles weren’t so easily explained away by science. The upcoming release Cabrini looks set to change that. The biographical film follows the life of Frances Xavier Cabrini, an Italian-American nun who became the first ever U.S citizen to be canonized by the Catholic Church. Even without the supposed miracles that led to her beatification, and later canonization, she lived an incredibly rich and interesting life that spanned two continents, and was known as a…