God Bless the Child

Respectable example of the kind of small social-issue film almost entirely relegated to TV then. The beatific appearance of Harewood's social worker raises the spectre of Saint Negro, but surprisingly the complex struggles of a black family come to take focus away from the white protagonists. And the story makes clear: some things are insoluble even for saints. I don't know that a TV movie ever had a more depressing ending. Winningham disappears into the character without making her a grotesque.