Don’t be fooled by Lifetime’s promotion of Twist of Faith (2013) as an interfaith romance. This extraordinarily bizarre film, starring Toni Braxton as a Methodist gospel singer who unbreaks the heart of a grieving Orthodox cantor, is something rarer: a religious Rorschach test from the same network that brought us Trapped by My Sugar Daddy, Psycho Yoga Instructor and Baby Monitor: The Sound of Fear. Whether it leaves you feeling uplifted or appalled is a matter of (very) personal taste — and to a lesser extent, a reflection of your ability to perform rudimentary math.
Twist of Faith’s timeline is shockingly condensed: Nearly as soon as we meet teacher and cantor Jacob Fisher (David Julian Hirsh), his wife and three children are lost to a senseless act of violence. After sitting shiva in a nearly catatonic state, he leaves his personal belongings behind — including his kippah and tzitzit — and boards a southbound bus from Brooklyn, finding himself homeless in rural Alabama. When Nina Jones (Braxton), a fellow teacher, first spots him, it’s hardly love at first sight. “There’s a white guy sleeping over there by the church. Keep your eye on him,” she warns her uncle Moe (Mykelti Williamson).
Worried about the safety of her son Asher (Nathaniel J. Potvin), whose name is perhaps a little too on-the-nose, Nina chases him off. But Moe and Asher, sensing that Jacob — unkempt and temporarily mute — is a lost soul, return him to the church next-door to their house. Citing Matthew 25, they give him a bedroom and bring him provisions (including — oy vey! — a peanut butter and cream cheese sandwich). He repays them by using his carpentry skills (here every Jewish reader will sigh deeply) to spruce up the joint.
Nina, appreciative but still suspicious, unsuccessfully searches for clues that might reveal the brooding, stubbly stranger’s identity. (Moe teasingly calls her “Sherlock Shaniqua Holmes.”) Her romantic stirrings are evident when Jacob, now verbal after nearly a month in Alabama, takes Asher’s hand and says grace before a family dinner. He is similarly drawn to her, and their attraction only grows as they bond over devotional music in the days leading up to her choir’s performance at a regional gospel competition.
If this partial synopsis makes Twist of Faith sound like a cross between Tender Mercies and Joyful Noise, it is something far weirder than that. Jacob is only a few weeks removed from an unimaginable loss (not that Nina’s aware of it), and in his traumatized state has impulsively shed nearly every possible vestige of his previous life… and we’re meant to regard it as healthy, sustainable and inspirational? Even if you’re willing to overlook the film’s religious insanity — a discussion I’ll leave to others — Twist of Faith’s chronology is perverse, and the encouragement Jacob receives from an unlikely source is equally bonkers.
That I cannot overstate Twist of Faith’s craziness is precisely why I intend to rewatch it in the coming weeks. It is unlike any tearjerker I’ve ever seen, partly because you could peel the layers of its bad decisions like an onion and it still kinda, sorta works. How does it do that? What the hell is Jacob thinking? What does Nina think she’s doing? When will they have a heart-to-heart about the confederate flag that welcomed him to town? At what point do the characters acknowledge that romantic faith is an entirely separate matter than religious faith? Why hasn’t Toni Braxton’s dramatic range improved in all the years since her terrible crying in the “Un-Break My Heart” music video?
These questions will keep me up tonight, though director Paul A. Kaufman deftly navigates one of those concerns by not demanding much of Braxton beyond her natural charisma. (She covers her face with her hands once or twice during pivotal dramatic moments, and Williamson and Hirsh anchor what she can’t.) One last question before wrapping this up: Does the average Lifetime viewer have any idea how many little things Jacob does that go against his religion? I’m not sure you can fully appreciate Hirsh’s performance without understanding the extent to which Jacob’s completely out of his element. If only he’d been Hasidic, I could eagerly refer you to my all-time favorite bad movie about Judaism, Sidney Lumet’s A Stranger Among Us.
Streaming and DVD availability
Twist of Faith isn’t available on DVD in the US, but it comes and goes on Lifetime’s Movie Club and currently streams free on YouTube. You can also check out its source material, A Narrow Bridge, a novel by J.J. Gesher (a pseudonym for Joyce Gittlin and Janet B. Fattal, who adapted the screenplay with Stephen Tolkin).
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Cranky Lesbian is a disgruntled homosexual with too much time on her hands. Click for film reviews or to follow on Instagram.
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