In this compelling no-frills documentary, a 69-year-old Benedictine nun rules a private home for recovering male addicts in the South Bronx with strict curfews, tough language and a large heart.
The Sundance Award-winning documentary captures in cinema verité style the no-nonsense day-to-day environment of Sister Helen's half-way house, which provides a private room in a structured environment for addicts. Structure is perhaps an understatement. The men in Sister Helen's residence must obey curfews, undergo frequent urine tests, participate in community service, seek employment and pay rent.
Sister Helen became a Benedictine nun at the age of 56, and shortly afterward founded the John Thomas Travis Center to "do for other people's sons what I couldn't do for my own." By providing shelter for recovering drug addicts and alcoholics, Sister Helen seeks self-redemption after the loss of a husband to alcoholism and the loss of two sons to drugs, one to drug-related murder. She herself is a recovering alcoholic.
Sister Helen's purpose is to help residents transition back into normal life within a half-year time period, by providing shelter, assistance and job references. Her unsentimental approach to the addicts can be hard to watch, but most of her residents respond and, for Sister Helen, "this house is my second chance."
