Which letter contains a hymn about Christ emptying Himself and being exalted?

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Progressive Christian

Last updated on: January 18, 2008 at 3:34 am by Cathleen Falsani

2008-01-18T03:34:00-07:00 Cathleen Falsani

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GODSTUFF

“FIRST SUNDAY” ISN’T GOOD, BUT ITS SOUL IS PRETTY GREAT

Last weekend, the No. 2 film in the nation, grossing a healthy $17.7 million at the box office, was a movie about redemption set almost entirely inside a church.

But few people I talked to this week, even in religious circles, had heard of “First Sunday,” the comedy starring Ice Cube and “Saturday Night Live” alumnus Tracy Morgan. No one else I know besides me had seen it.

And that’s too bad.

Now, I don’t want to make “First Sunday” sound like a masterpiece because it most certainly is not. In fact, “First Sunday” really isn’t a very good movie.

On the contrived scale, the screenplay lands somewhere between Hallmark Original Movie and after-school special. There are enough slapstick clichés and stereotyped caricatures — the dopey-but-loveable hoodlum (Morgan), the quintessential church lady (played with enormous grace by the veteran actress Olivia Cole, the first African-American woman to win an Emmy for Outstanding Actress in a TV Movie, by the way), the over-the-top fey choir director (Katt Williams), and a money-hungry deacon (Michael Beech) — to fill an entire broadcast season on the CW.

What makes “First Sunday” a movie worth seeing is its soul, about which it is unapologetically forthright and eloquent.

“First Sunday” follows two down-on-their-luck childhood friends, Durrell (Cube) and LeeJohn (Morgan), who get pinched by the police in inner-city Baltimore while driving a van full of presumably stolen, pimped-out wheelchairs for a Jamaican street gang. A merciful-yet-maniacal judge (Keith David) spares them prison time, but sentences them to 5,000 hours of community service.

While picking up garbage across the street from a big neighborhood church, they follow a beautiful woman (who turns out to be the pastor’s fiery daughter) into a swinging gospel service, where they the congregation has raised more than $200,000 for a building fund.

Because the Jamaican gang has promised to kill LeeJohn if he doesn’t come up with $12,000 for the lost wheelchairs, and because Durrell’s baby mama has threatened to take their son to Atlanta if he can’t come up with $17,000 to keep her hair salon open, the duo decides to break into the church and boost the building fund.

You can probably guess the next third of the film: The robbery goes awry — the church board is meeting in a nearby room and the choir is practicing in the sanctuary downstairs, hostages are taken, and hilarity (or attempts at it, anyway) ensues.

“First Sunday” was written and directed by David E. Talbert, a tremendously successful playwright in what is called, variously, the “urban theater,” “gospel theater,” and the “chitlin’ circuit.” For more than 15 years, Talbert, the son and grandson of pastors and Pentecostal evangelists, has packed venues with plays such as “Love on Lay Away” and “Lawd Ha’ Mercy.” He clearly knows (and loves) the world from which this genre grows.

Most critics mention Talbert in the same breath as Tyler Perry, another writer/director who started on the urban theater circuit before translating his plays — most of them featuring the take-no-prisoners, gun-toting big-mama Madea (played by Perry himself in drag) — into wildly popular films such as “Diary of a Mad Black Woman,” which has grossed more than $50 million since its release in 2005.

Both Perry and Talbert’s film work is far from cinematic greatness in any superficial artistic sense. But both have their considerable charms and spiritual chops. I first watched a Perry film — I think it was “Madea’s Family Reunion” — on cable a year or so ago. On first pass, I thought it was terrible — predictable, overacted, tied up in a neat bow at the end. But then I found myself wanting to see it again. And again. I now own it.

There’s something so satisfying and comforting about the wisdom spouted by the infectiously funny Madea character. She’s not pious, not terribly likable, and carries a gun (not a Bible.) But the woman is spiritually profound. I’m telling you, when I’m feeling down and oppressed, the movie or one of dozens of video clips of the Madea plays that are available on YouTube pull me right out of my funk.

Madea says things like, “Some people are leaves on a tree . . . [They’ll] wither and die and blow away. There ain’t no need to be praying over a leaf to be resurrected. When it’s dead, it’s gone. Let it go!”

I found a similar beauty in “First Sunday,” that came in the nuanced way the good church folks — among them the pastor (Chi McBride), his daughter (Malinda Williams), and the warm-hearted “Sister Doris” (Loretta Devine) — treat Durrell and LeeJohn. One startlingly tender scene between LeeJohn and Sister Doris brought tears to my eyes and, from the sniffles emanating from a young couple a few rows behind me in the theater, I wasn’t alone.

A whole lot of grace was hiding behind the sight gags and slap-stickery.

I don’t want to spoil the end of the film, but suffice to say I’ve yet to see a clearer depiction of the true message of Christianity on the big screen.

Love’s power is limitless. Forgiveness is always possible. True change does happen.

And a movie doesn’t have to be good to be great.

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