Jonathan Storm: Lifetime's 'Sins' brings God into the picture

Imagine a TV movie in which people put their faith in God and go to church, and it's not some big joke.

Not to get on a soapbox, but TV is a pretty godless place, so many viewers might find a refreshing change of pace in Lifetime Movie Network's Sins of the Mother, starring Philadelphian actor/singer Jill Scott, premiering Sunday at 8 p.m.

Lifetime's movie channel is different from the mother ship, usually found fairly low on the cable lineup. LMN, on the other hand, is up there in the 100s, generally Channel 119 on Comcast.

This is not some didactic Christian tract. There's a pregnant bride and a very modest sex scene. Sins of the Mother presents God the way God exists in most Americans' lives, a real presence in a secular world.

The movie's script is not exactly great literature. "Eventually, we all have to face our demons," says one helpful college professor.

"Sometimes you have to step out of your comfort zone. That's how we grow," says a well-meaning friend.

"Sometimes the people you love the most are the ones you hurt the most," says Scott's character, Nona.

The target of all these bland aphorisms is a 25-year-old woman named LaShay, a terribly angry child of alcoholism who winds up back home with her mother - even though LaShay seems to have nothing but contempt and hate for her - because there's nowhere else to go.

Scott plays Nona, the mom, who has finally given up the bottle and gotten her life together, but not before one final drunken fling, which had the positive effect of producing Sunshine, an adorable child now 5. Monaeya Silveira's countenance lights up this movie whenever she's in it.

In fact, all the little-known supporting actors - it's Lifetime, not HBO - do a fine job, especially Matt Ward as Oliver and Katharine Isabelle, a veteran TV guest star, as Ivy.

But the network did sign newcomer Nicole Beharie, who's going to be a big star, to play LaShay. She has made only three movies including this one, but recently won the African American Film Critics award for best actress, for American Violet. She beat Gabourey Sidibe, the more widely acclaimed star of Precious, causing a huge rift among the black film critics. It was such a brouhaha that Beharie gave the award back. That's the trouble with acting awards. Both performances are amazing.

And you can say the same for Beharie and Scott in Sins of the Mother. Rarely has such fine acting found such a pedestrian vehicle, lifting it in a way that will produce torrents of tears among a swath of sensitive viewers.

"The reason that I am sober today is only because of God's mercy," Nona declares in a church scene that may be contrived but is also respectful and moving, basically like the entire movie.

Will LaShay ever forgive her mother and get on with her life? Will Nona stay sober? Will the drunken Ivy, whom Nona sponsors in Alcoholics Anonymous, find some way to get her act together?

These are not the sorts of questions addressed by the latest sex-and-drugs shoot-'em-up cable series, but they are much more common in normal life, and there should be a place on television for that, too.

Television

Sins of the Mother

8 p.m. Sunday on Lifetime Movie Network