Amazing Grace (2018)

Amazing Grace
Directed by Alan Elliott and Sydney Pollock
2018/US
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube rental

Rev. Franklin: I went in the cleaners one day in Detroit to pick up some clothes, and Aretha had appeared on a recent television show. And she told me, “I saw your daughter Aretha last night.” I said, “Yes? How did you like it?” She said, “It was all right. But I’ll be glad when she comes back to the church.” I said, “Listen baby, let me tell you something. If you want to know the truth, she has never left the church.”

This concert film captures a two-day session that produced the tracks for Aretha Franklin’s  “Amazing Grace” album (1972), which remains the best-selling gospel album of all time as well as the best-selling album of Franklin’s career.  It was filmed at the New Bethel Baptist Church in Watts, Los Angeles on Jan. 13 and 14, 1972, with a crew of film and sound engineers and five 16mm cameras, all directed by Sidney Pollack.  She was backed by Rev. James Cleveland and the Southern California Community Choir.

Unfortunately, Pollack had never made a concert film and the editing process was beset with technical difficulties.  Pollack turned it over to Alan Everett in 2007 when he was dying of cancer.

If you love Aretha Franklin, as I do, you will not want to miss this.  She really pulls out all the stops.  Recommended.