This is almost a musical, in several cases characters break out in song where we would normally expect dialog. But it isn't excessive and it works well.I saw this on DVD, now I wish I had seen it during the Christmas season for its message. A teenage boy in Baltimore with an unavailable dad and a single mom unable to pay the bills. So he is sent to stay with his grandparents in New York (Harlem). His grandfather happens to be a charismatic preacher, but with issues of his own.I became interested in seeing this for the superb cast, mostly actors I have seen and enjoyed in a number of roles. Forest Whitaker is the grandfather, Reverend Cornell Cobbs. His prize possession is a gold pocket watch with an inscription, a gift from MLK. The grandmother is Angela Bassett as Aretha Cobbs.But my favorite is Jennifer Hudson as the single mom, pregnant at 15. Naima is working at a couple of jobs but needs to come up with $5000 to avoid eviction, and has no way to get it legally. Her acting is spot-on and her singing superb as always.The 15-yr-old son is played well by 16-yr-old Jacob Latimore as Langston. The movie's title refers to a Christmastime Black Nativity presentation at grandpa's church. The ending and reconciliations work a bit too easily at the end, but the message of family and forgiveness is clear. Good movie, better then its IMDb rating (4.0 right now) would indicate. But it has a religious theme so people who object to that will not like it.SPOILERS: When Naimi became pregnant she became a family outcast, and the Reverend paid the dad $5000 to agree to never see her or the baby again. All this alienation ended up with Naimi in Baltimore and not speaking to her parents. At the end of the movie the Reverend confessed his "sin" to the whole congregation and his family, they forgave each other.

"Proof of God's grace is all around you, you just have to open your eyes." After struggling single mom Naima (Hudson) is faced with foreclosure and homelessness right before Christmas she decides to send her son Langston to live with his grandparents. Her father Reverend Cobbs (Whitaker) and his wife gladly take him in even though none of them know each other. Langston wants nothing more then to get back home to his mother and will do anything to make that happen. When a stranger offers to help his life is changed. Even though the cast for this movie is good I was not thrilled about watching this. After watching it my preconceptions were pretty much right on. It wasn't terrible but it was just so over-the-top cheesy that it made it a little hard to get into and enjoy. If this was a made-for-TV movie it would have been OK but the fact that this was a theater release really makes you wonder why this got that kind of distribution when there are so many other more deserving movies that don't get the wide release this one did. Overall, cheesy and nothing amazing. It is a Christmas movie though so that has to be taken into account. I give this a C+.

BLACK NATIVITY has a lot of singing. People sing in church, but they also sing on the sidewalk, they sing in the street, and they sing at the bus station. If this movie had scenes in public rest rooms, like many of today's films, someone surely would be singing in there, as well. This flick also jumps around a lot. It goes in and out of dreams, as people nod off in church. One minute Jennifer Hudson's character is in Baltimore; the next, she's in Harlem, with not so much as a clicking of Ruby Red Slippers to explain her transit. Every character here seems Gung Ho for public humiliation. Names are dropped, including Martin Luther King, Jesus Christ, and Langston Hughes, but plugs also are given for specific brands of money-getter guns. The folks in this flick would suffer fewer headaches in someone would drive a pick-up truck on a route everyday--like a newspaper delivery person--but hand out bundles of cash instead of papers. Maybe this sequel could be entitled BANK ACTIVITY.

I think that this was well put together but it was not at all what i expected. A lot more singing and the story line could have been explored a bit more. It is sad when my wife who is not an avid movie goer is able to answer all the questions that should be discovered over the entirety of the movie.Plus:Great music and top notch singers and performers.Introduction to new artist coming on the scene.Negative:Movie never develops a rich story line in my opinion and some of the scenes were hard to follow. overall:Great movie for fellow music lovers it was like watching a long music video.