11 Memorable Movie Nuns

Sister Acts: 11 Memorable Movie Nuns

By Paul Asay

Typically, nuns avoid the spotlight. Few make YouTube videos or try out for "American Idol." They spend their days modestly, often in seclusion, deflecting attention away from themselves and to the One they serve. I can't think of the last time Perez Hilton took an interest in a nun.

So why, then, does Hollywood make such a (ahem) habit of including nuns in its movies? Is it their piety that makes them so compelling? Their ability (or inability) to balance strict lives of obedience with the ever-encroaching secular world? Their fetching headgear?

The legendary Meryl Streep, who plays the forbidding Sister Aloysius Beauvier in "Doubt," is just the latest high-powered actress to step into a habit. Here's a look at some of moviedom's most memorable nuns.