Sidney Poitier plays Homer Smith in this classic adapted from the 1962 novel Lilies of the Field. Smith is a drifter and meets his destiny after stopping to attain water for his car in a small Arizona town. He encounters nuns working feverishly and unsuccessfully on a fence and offers to help with the hopes of receiving money in exchange. Smith, who once dreamed of becoming an architect, stays overnight, assuming he would get paid. He was asked again by Mother Maria to do more repairs—this time the roof. Smith is roped into staying overnight with hopes of collecting his money. The nuns realize that Smith was sent by God to help build the church and press him to stay. Smith is a Baptist and isn’t amused about going or building a Catholic chapel. By living with the nuns he learns the back-story of Mother Maria’s adventure of climbing the Berlin wall to freedom. Smith’s heart melts. He knew that despite donations of lumber and supplies, the nuns could not clear the land or erect the beams for the chapel, and decides to remain and build the church, where he inevitably fulfils his own dreams and the vision of the nuns.

~ Corine Gatti