King of Prussia businessman J. Eustace Wolfington was finally persuaded to raise $50 million for the new movie “Cabrini” after a 2011 visit from the former head of Cabrini College in Radnor, Sister Mary Louise Sullivan.

The movie is about St. Francesca Saverio Cabrini, a relentless Italian American nun who was an immigrant advocate and a builder of shelters, hospitals, and schools, writes Joseph N. DiStefano for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Wolfington had no interest in making any movie, even if it was about his favorite saint.

But he changed his mind when he saw the film’s intent would be a pious and bland version of Cabrini’s dramatic life.

“I had to make a better movie — to capture who she was, a woman who didn’t take ‘no’ for an answer, not from the pope, not from her archbishop, not from the mayor of New York or the head of the Senate in Italy,” he said.

Cabrini challenged violent public prejudice, the church, and civil authorities to help immigrants who were despised in New York and Chicago.

Wolfington’s backed film opened two weekends ago in King of Prussia and nationwide on March 1.  

Find out how J. Eustace Wolfington got involved in the making of “Cabrini” in The Philadelphia Inquirer.