Come to the Stable (1949)

There was always something of the butter wouldn’t melt about Loretta Young but rarely more so in this enjoyable caper of two nuns who set about building a children’s hospital. Her sister “Margaret” has travelled from wartime France with her colleague “Scholastica” (Celeste Holm) and they have arrived at what they reckon, thanks to a nativity at the home of the eccentric “Miss Potts” (Elsa Lanchester), is a divinely inspired site. There’s plenty of land and an old factory for them to use so all they need do now is get the bishop to give them some cash and away they go. Unfortunately, he (Basil Ruysdael) hasn’t the cash nor is he convinced that they will ever get the land owner to sell. Undaunted, they set off on that task and so follows a series of amiable escapades involving gangsters, a songwriter who doesn’t really want them in his backyard (Hugh Marlowe), plenty of noisy geese, ducks, jams and the best example of a fully frocked nun playing tennis you are ever likely to see. Is there any doubt as to the conclusion? Well no, indeed that aspect of the film is all rather rushed. It’s the path to that which brings a feel-good factor to the proceedings with these two persistent women staying just the right side of annoying as they mix dedication with a certain degree of serendipity to attain their goal. It has the feel of a Christmas film to it, with messages of humanity and decency writ large; Lanchester plays engagingly as the well-meaning but slightly dotty “Potts” and though I could have been doing with a little more from Holm, she and Young deliver a mischievous blend of tenacity and the silly quite entertainingly.