MamaGravity good back-story, and good acting

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Jonah Abbott There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

JLRMovieReviews In one of his later films, Elvis Presley plays a doctor in a rough part of town and has requested some nurses who can handle themselves. What he didn't expect was that they would turn out to be nuns, but he is not told that in the beginning. Mary Tyler Moore, Barbara McNair and Jane Elliott are the nuns, who dress without their habits to be a part of the people and not be treated differently. Of course there is animosity and attraction between Mary and Elvis, and, while that is a subplot that is always there, it takes the back burner to the patients, including a young girl who's autistic and a young man who stutters and is a little disturbed and has a way with knives. This is better than it sounds, due in part to their compassion for their patients, therefore making the characters very real and three-dimensional. Jane Elliott and Barbara McNair give good support and deliver their line with much zest and pizazz. What really hurts the film in my opinion is the music. I think the film's dramatic impact would have been strengthened by the lack of music and the songs, while upbeat, tend to be rather corny in this tough neighborhood. While it would have been a good drama, it was only slowed down and made a bit odd by the use of music in the film. One can only think that they inserted songs to not disappoint Elvis die-hard fans, expecting it. And another thing that hurts is the subplot of a Mr. Big, who you don't want to owe money to. That plot wraps up rather unbelievably. I think I read somewhere that Ms. Moore had to deflect Elvis' advances during the making of this film. "Change of Habit" makes for interesting drama with a few unnecessary songs and contains a rather unresolved ending concerning Mary and Elvis. Or does it?

gullwing592003 1969 was more than a change of habit but a change of direction for Elvis. Years of formula musicals drained all the interest & passion Elvis had early on. Charro is a decent western showing Elvis the actor but Change Of Habit is a religious drama, social commentary & a musical, the combination doesn't work. It's a good serious attempt but the songs get in the way & don't fit. Elvis never really sinks his teeth & gets deep into his role & he just skims & glides on the surface. Not for a moment is he convincing as a doctor who has to break into a song because he's Elvis Presley.....what a coincidence. It's a movie that should've never been made. For his last 2 films Charro is the quality movie.

kalgo-725-870078 I did not know what I was getting into when I started watching this one. I will cut it some slack for being a product of the movie model of the 60s. I can't say that I hated it, but I can't say that it is a good movie. It was impactful on me and I am glad I watched. Though it is not a serious movie, it deserves to be studied in sociology and psychiatry courses, though not necessarily taken seriously, more considered the expression of some crazy ideas of the time. as the film does try to put some social messages out there, and how it deals with issues is unique(humorous) to say the least. First, the basics: Elvis was miscast in this one, and it was impossible to take him seriously, and it hurt the movie, and the whole role and whole idea that one would cast Elvis in this role seems very odd. I felt like a much more attractive(sexy) Sister Barbara(Jane Elliot) should have been the love interest. The clothes that Elvis wore and the way he strutted down the street several times was odd. Some of the lines, like "the last two nurses were raped, and one of them against her will.." interesting, amusing, priceless. lol All angles of a Hollywood version of a slum were covered in kooky fashion; black panthers, mafia overlord, corrupt police(only mentioned), drugs(heroin, referred to as "h"), rape, theft, racism, what am I forgetting? lol I thought it was odd that Dr. Carpenter was a bit of a wolf with his new nurse, as it cast him as a bit of a out-of-character villain. I think it would have been much more effective if his affectionate overtones toward her had been more subtle, if not professionally appropriate. lol I couldn't understand why the three nuns were so disgusted with their accommodations. It didn't look so bad to me and it revealed them to be weak. lol Now the more interesting stuff: Every patient has a different problem, and all are solved by our illustrious doctor. Just preposterous! and pushes forward the notion that our medical establishment wields such scientific and indisputable power that it solves all our problems, and we would have to be fools not to avail ourselves of their wisdom. Poppycock! Additionally, all our problems are treatable and understood by them. More poppycock! The Mary Tyler Moore character is going to treat an autistic kid with "patience", as if that will help, and he, a ghetto doctor, is going to unleash the latest experimental methods to treat autism, yikes! And the child, after enduring this ridiculous "restrain-ment torture", and being told endlessly by strangers that they "love her", wow! What a train wreck, I really couldn't turn away, and my wife couldn't look! lol And the implication that the autism is a choice on the little girl's part. Laughable and dangerous! Julio and his stuttering. Too much. And the implication on our Doctor's part that to improve Julio's speech would help improve his confidence, and that would likely unleash the real demons inside(my interpretation), wow! And then the doctor saves Mary from Julios' attempted rape. Good heavens! lol And the only police officer we get to meet(Ed Asner) is some kind of social professor? lol And towards the end, Mary Tyler Moore quotes Sr. Barbara who just made a social and intellectual statement, and Mary asks: "Is she a communist?" What, are smart, socially aware people to be labeled and derided? I guess so when everyone else is a moron. lol And our Doctor sends his new nurse out to make house calls, and has no idea of her capabilities? Seems senseless and wreckless, especially considering that he showed no faith in them. lol Final thought-In the middle of this ghetto and horrid existence, they take a break on the weekend to cast off their woes and play football in the park. It is apparently a special time when the world is magical, all get along, poverty is to be forgotten, until Monday. lol Elvis and Mary take the girl Amanda, cured now, on a carousel, and sing about a "sunshine place", I believe, and she is to smile. It was like a drug induced dream, kinda creepy, and it seemed to me that the girl was the only one still in reality, and it was "they" would who were dragging her into their unrealistic, unsustainable, fantasy world of smiles and horrible creepy song. lol The girl was not broken, they are. No wonder she is shutting the world out! lol

Ankhoryt One star for Elvis, one for Mary Tyler Moore, four stars for good intentions in depicting the racism, violence, and crime (particularly loan sharking in the character of The Banker) afflicting the poor. The other four stars are lost because of the relentless sexism the writers perpetrated while addressing practically every other -ism out there (even the inclusion of two significant minor characters with disabilities.) "What do you think we are, faggots?" This is the line from one of the men whose been enticed to move furniture after one of the nuns dresses like a prostitute and hollers "I need a man!" to try to get some help from the idlers across the street. Seriously. She puts on sheer black stockings, hooker lipstick and hair, and pulls her dress down off her shoulders. (Remember, this movie is not supposed to be one of Elvis' farces; we're supposed to take this seriously.) The faggot remark comes after she suggests the piano is very heavy. The nun apparently doesn't understand the comment, or chooses not to. Maybe by identifying homophobia with alcoholic ne'er-do-wells, the writers were trying to cast aspersions on that point of view; maybe that's as "out" as they could be about it.The Hispanic characters are depicted with some sympathy. The black nun, Irene (Barbara McNair), is trapped in a stairwell by two black activists who accuse her of "selling out" to "those ofay chicks" (that means white, if you haven't heard it before, and is a reference to the two white nuns), gets into a squabble about "Negro" v. "Black" and is told by the men that's she's too pretty not to stay pretty - a threat to mutilate her unless she... what? Unless she becomes a black separatist? What's the scene for, to identify black men as just generically all-purpose menacing? Well, yes, but only *angry and political* black men, contrasted to the woman's nose-to-the-grindstone apolitical and assimilationist work ethic. It's depressing to realize that yes, for its time, this probably *was* progressive. (In a later scene, Irene bluntly discusses the n-word with the Elvis character; that was *definitely* progressive back then!) Eventually, the black activists demonstrate peaceful intentions.So maybe, as some of the other commenters suggest, this was a serious attempt at being progressive racial and social justice commentary. The big bad however, here, is that the movie relies very heavily on sexual stereotyping. The nuns are subjected to the hateful misogynist Father Gibbons, the one who imitated the hooker is nearly subjected to what certainly sounds like it could develop into a gang rape "party" from the men who moved the furniture, and the young doctor treats his nurses very poorly indeed when they are just his office "girls" before he learns they are nuns.Also troubling, but not at all the movie's fault, is the diagnosis of a child as autistic "because she was rejected by her mother" - a theory totally discredited now - and the reliance on "holding" therapy, also discredited. "Holding" therapy has gotten children killed via suffocation, so don't try this at home. It's creepy to see it, even though the writers and producers did not know better at the time.But about the sexism, yes indeed, they did know better. By 1969, the Second Wave of feminism had been underway for several years and it's annoying to see MTM here, as she often was in "That Girl," forced to play a 50's stereotype as the 70's were about to begin.HIGHLIGHTS: A very young Ed Asner is a stitch as the neighborhood cop; if you're a fan, you won't want to miss his too-short, too-few scenes. Also, anyone who remembers the fury of pre-Vatican II Catholics at the inception of "guitar Masses" will be delighted by Elvis' rendering of same.