Amazing Grace

It's taken nearly half a century, but Aretha Franklin fans will consider it well worth the wait to finally be able to see Sydney Pollack's verité record of her two-night sojourn at New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in the Watts district of Los Angeles. After all, it spawned Amazing Grace, the highest-selling gospel album of all time. Having released 20 albums and 11 chart-topping singles, Franklin felt the need to go back to her roots in January 1972. Accompanied by the Reverend James Cleveland and the Southern California Community Choir, she's in soul-tingling form here, as she sings a selection of gospel standards and contemporary items like Marvin Gaye's Wholy Holy and Carole King's You've Got a Friend. With her preacher father, CL Franklin, gospel diva Clara Ward and Rolling Stones Mick Jagger and Charlie Watts in attendance, this is, in every sense, a momentous event. Pollack keeps things simple in switching between Franklin seated at her piano or standing in the pulpit. But there's plenty going on in the choir and the congregation to keep things interesting. Thrillingly inspirational.