'Black Nativity' is bold but clumsy.

• Author: Chang, Justin
• Position: Living - Movie review

Byline: Justin Chang

LOS ANGELES -- A child is born, a family is healed, and a sermon on forgiveness is delivered with sledgehammer subtlety in "Black Nativity,'' a bold but clumsy attempt to bring Langston Hughes' popular musical to life onscreen.

You have to admire the earnest, nakedly emotional approach taken by writer-director Kasi Lemmons as she seeks a free-form cinematic equivalent of Hughes' stage show-cum-worship service -- a rousing fusion of pageantry, gospel music and 19th-century folk spirituals that has been a holiday perennial since its first off-Broadway production in 1961.

But the film miscalculates by planting this African-American interpretation of the nativity story at the center of an angsty troubled-teen melodrama that, from mean-streets prologue to Christmas Eve climax, simply fails to inspire belief.

Still, its faith-based thrust and highly marketable musical elements should connect with viewers inclined to welcome the momentary transformation of their movie theater into a church -- specifically, a black Baptist church energetically presided over by the Rev. Cornell Cobbs (Forest Whitaker), one of the principal characters in this fractious family drama.

Lemmons signals her stylistic intentions early on by letting her characters give full-blown musical expression to their oft-bruised hopes and dreams, enabled by a slate of songs produced by Raphael Saadiq (who also composed the score with Laura Karpman). It's days before Christmas when moody Baltimore teenager Langston (Jacob Latimore), named after the Harlem Renaissance writer-activist himself, learns that he and his recently laid-off mother, Naima (Jennifer Hudson), are about to be evicted.

Although Naima has been estranged from her parents for years, her circumstances are desperate enough that she sends Langston to New York to spend the holidays with the grandparents he's never met, Cornell and Aretha (Angela Bassett).

Lemmons (helming her first feature since 2006's underrated Petey Greene biopic "Talk to Me'') leads her story down various historical avenues of black experience, whether quoting from Hughes' poetry or illuminating Cornell's experience as a young boy participating in the civil rights movement.

The director also introduces a contemporary version of Mary and Joseph in the form of a homeless, pregnant couple (Grace Gibson, Luke James)...