1949 - COME TO THE STABLE, a film with Nuns in it.

A couple of very pushy nuns arrive in New England with plans to build a hospital.  During World War II their hospital in France was saved by the American Army although many soldiers died defending it. To atone for that tragedy they are now committed to building a hospital in a small New England town.  The trouble is that the land that they want is owned by a godless songwriter who would prefer the nuns would just go away.  So begins a battle of wills.

Come to the Stable could have been one sentimental mess of religious garbage but the writers and the director of this film seemed to have enough self control to spare the viewer from the worst.

 

Let's take a quick look at the cast.  Actor Loretta Young a "super catholic" in real life plays one of the nuns.  Young had an affair with Clark Gable on the set of The Call of the Wild which resulted in her giving birth to Gable's child.  Young had the baby placed in an orphanage and later adopted the baby even though she was the birth mother. Yes this is one of the subplots in the Coen Brothers film Hail Caesar

Celeste Holm plays the other nun, scene stealer Elsa Lancester is a painter of religious pictures and character actor Thomas Gomez is the bookie who helps Young raise the money to build the hospital, it's a decent cast.

Also in the film is Hugh Marlowe as the godless songwriter.  Marlowe was one of those working actors who turned up in a lot of films and TV shows.  I'm most familiar with Marlowe as  Dr. Russell Marvin the scientist who battles the space aliens in Ray Harryhausen's science fiction classic Earth Vs. The Flying Saucers.  A final casting note is the appearance of Dooley Wilson in a not insubstantial part.  Wilson is best known as Sam the pianist in Casablanca. 

 

 The director Henry Koster was an expert at this family entertainment stuff for most of his career. At the end of his career, he directed The Singing Nun, but that Nun movie turned out to be pretty terrible.

This film runs 94 and although I enjoyed it for the most part I certainly didn't want it to be a minute longer.  Come to the Stable was written by Oscar Millard and Sally Benson.