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'The Preacher's Wife': One Foot in Heaven

In "The Preacher's Wife," director Penny Marshall and company pump the movie so full of goodwill that it's surprising the thing doesn't float away. But as balloons go, this African Americanization of the 1947 movie "The Bishop's Wife" is a welcome boost for audiences seeking images of black characters without criminal tendencies. And there's a buoyant performance from Denzel Washington as a somewhat mischievous angel who saves a church, a community and a marriage.

Although the movie, which also stars Whitney Houston and Courtney B. Vance, is pleasant, its cheery spirit gets a little sluggish in places. Marshall, who also made "Big" and "Awakenings," directs the proceedings with her usual over-ingratiating approach. It's also clear from the outset that "The Preacher's Wife" amounts to a vanity project for Houston, who showboats her way through 10 songs.

In a black neighborhood somewhere in the urban Northeast, St. Matthew's Church is the religious glue that holds the community together. But there's no rest for its reverend, Henry Biggs (Vance).

There are ailing churchgoers to be visited in the hospital, teenagers to be coaxed back into the flock (and in one case out of jail) and an aging boiler that's about to give out. In his zeal to stay on top of things, however, Henry is ignoring his wife, Julia (Houston), and his 5-year-old son, Jeremiah (Justin Pierre Edmund).

When the preacher utters a prayer to the Almighty, he gets an answer in the form of Dudley (Washington), a sweet-natured stranger in a gray suit who offers his celestial services, free of charge.

The angel is just in time. The marriage is heading nowhere fast; and the strapped reverend is about to reluctantly accept an offer from an unscrupulous developer (Gregory Hines), who intends to raze St. Matthew's and turn the property into a decidedly unspiritual, glass-domed, futuristic Church World.

Dudley seems to be more trouble then help at first. His rapt attentions toward the neglected Julia raise the suspicions of Julia's mother (Jenifer Lewis), who lives with the family. And when Dudley takes Julia dancing at the very nightclub where she used to sing, and where Henry proposed to her, the preacher gets a little hot under the dog collar.

Will Dudley restore Henry's flagging faith and get the right love affair back on track? This is hardly an edge-of-the-seat worry for the audience, but it's an excuse to revel somewhat comically in the joys of religion -- particularly black, middle-class religion.

Besides Washington's likable presence, Vance has amusing moments as the put-upon straight man, as does Lewis as Julia's tell-it-like-it-is mother, Marguerite. When Julia protests that -- as far as Dudley goes -- she's only window-shopping, Marguerite has a no-nonsense response. "You'd better not go window-shopping with money in your pocket," she says sternly. "And you'd better not put money in the layaway plan." Where you stand on sitcom-standard jokes like this is probably where you'll stand on enjoying the movie.

The Preacher's Wife is rated PG and contains nothing objectionable except the prospect of extramarital seduction.