With the public primed by Amazing Grace, the documentary about the making of Aretha Franklin’s 1972 gospel album, it’s a propitious time to view Patrinell: The Total Experience. Reverend Patrinell Staten Wright is the closest thing Seattle has to the Queen of Soul (albeit with a heavier emphasis on church life), and this film portrays the septuagenarian gospel/R&B singer’s inspirational story with utmost reverence. A strict disciplinarian, Wright headed the multiracial Total Experience Gospel Choir and impacted hundreds of lives through her spiritual and artistic tutelage. Patrinell reveals a woman who’s battled racism, sexism, gentrification, and health problems to become what one of her protégés called “our Rosa Parks, MLK, and Barack Obama.”
Patrinell: The Total Experience screens this Sunday and Monday, May 26 and 27, at the 45th Seattle International Film Festival. Further details here. Check out The Stranger‘s complete SIFF guide here.
