If some incarnation of “Glee” were to be developed for the Christian Broadcasting Network, it would probably look a lot like “Joyful Noise.” When the church choir in depressed, small-town Pacashau, Ga., loses its leader (Kris Kristofferson) to a heart attack, veteran singer Vi Rose Hill (Queen Latifah) is tapped to take over, rather than the late director’s widow, G.G. Sparrow (Dolly Parton). Vi Rose is a modest, conservative Christian nurse raising her two teenage kids on her own while her husband’s away serving in the Army. G.G. is all sass and big hair and folksy metaphors, usually involving animals: “There’s always free cheese in the mousetrap, but trust me, the mice there ain’t happy.” It’s who you might imagine Parton’s “Steel Magnolias” character had become a couple decades later, if you were to ponder such questions.

Anyway, Vi Rose and G.G. hurl passive-aggressive barbs at each other in a continuation of a long-standing hatred that’s never fully explained, and probably should have been. Guess they just plain don’t like each other. So when G.G.’s nebulously naughty grandson, Randy (Jeremy Jordan), moves back to town and promptly falls for Vi Rose’s blossoming, 16-year-old songbird daughter, Olivia (Keke Palmer), the women’s animosity boils over and threatens to destroy the entire choir as we know it — right as they’re gaining momentum in the annual National Joyful Noise Competition.