Burning Cane

"You will never be truly happy and fulfilled if you try to hang on to possessions." Reverend Tillman (Wendell Pierce)

You can almost smell the cane burning in Phillip Youmans' Burning Cane on Netflix. Such is the synesthetic cinematic experience that every word and every image carry weight on the sense and sensibility not ordinarily given to short films. While we can easily rely on the meaning of the pastor's familiar intonation, the demanding drama will depict lives looking for meaning not in possessions.

The isolation characters feel and their lack of trust in God and each other form the dramatic foundation of this still beautiful and memorable film as homily. This brooding tone poem briefly lets you into the personal lives of deeply spiritual and flawed folks in the cane fields of rural Louisiana.

Tillman struggles with the depression of being a recent widower, and the demon bottle helps little. Just the same with Daniel (Dominique McClellan), only he's a job widower, who listens little to mother Helen (Karen Kaia Livers), who listens to the Lord through the Bible. He is indeed her Shepard.

Not always bound to the dreamy world of worship, Helen reminds Daniel that his father died of AIDS. Besides the poetic qualities of this drama is the reality of life in general and rural poverty in particular. Youmans' camera lingers in the passageways and corners to let you live with these complicated characters, never imposing anything more that deeply-felt emotion sometimes embodied in gospel tunes or in simple dialogue that says much more than it is.

Writer, director, cinematographer, and editor Philip Youmans won Best Narrative feature at the Tribeca Film Festival 2019 as well as Best Cinematography. Pierce won best actor. In other words, this well-pedigreed first feature from Youmans is worth your 77 min, for it embraces small lives with feeling. An enjoyable emotional experience.

BTW, Youmans was 19 when he launched this gem, a senior in high school.

I watched this film because I'm a big fan of Wendell Pierce. I think he's an incredible actor who's talent is underutilized. Whereas Mr. Pierce's talent shone through in this film, the film itself was murky. It was slow; the film was poorly lit; the message too be conveyed, if there was a message, was absent from the film; and the writing seemed unsteady. I feel like I wasted my 78 minutes on characters who were not likeable and who were extremely detached from each other and from the film. This film was over-hyped and a waste of time, and I can't help but think that the critics raved over the film because it presented yet another set of black folks who were downtrodden, addicted to a substance, and self-pitying.

...it's dark (did the DP leave his thumb over the iPhone camera?), somewhat incomprehensible, rather boring and obviously a freshman effort.

The actors' performances are very strong, but the film literally lulled me to sleep.

The gushing over the young director (okay, he made the film in high school, rah, rah, rah) and existence of 20+ Marvel Cinematic Universe "films" may indicate the end of civilization is near.

Suppose it was time for "Beasts of the Southern Wild 2," because this is it. That film was much more interesting.

This is definitely not the worst movie I have ever seen! But it definitely moves very slowly with a depressing storyline that is very difficult to follow. An hour in, frankly, I'm still not very sure of the storyline itself. Honestly, I had to refer to online reviews to understand it other than the fact that it revolves around lost, broken black men and religion. In fact, the storyline is so poorly drawn compounded with the way the camera often pans in and out, one initially believes there may be sexual abuse of Jeremiah by his father given the heavy use of alcohol in some of the scenes. Thankfully I guess that's not the case. The cinematography really threw me because some of the scenes are so dark that I literally cannot make out what's happening. At other times, the outdoor scenes are really beautiful and well done. The characters are quite one-dimensional which is also unfortunate. Jeremiah is something of a prop because we really don't know anything about him. The father is also largely just a shadowy drunk. Toward the end, we get rushed information about him through a single narrative/conversation but it would have been nice to have found out more about his life progressively throughout the film. We don't really understand how he came to be a drunk. Obviously, he wasn't born a drunk. Did he ever work? Did he ever leave this area and come back? Was he ever NOT depressed? He nearly becomes a ghost before we know anything about how he actually lived. Same with the stereotypical Pastor. By now, I think we've seen enough films from scarred black people who have been to churches with fallen pastors. Not every Pastor in the black church is shady though. Just want to put that out there. Anyway, the film could have been clearer but for a 19 year old, I'm going to give him some leeway.

I absolutely loved this movie. Very well done. I felt left hanging at the finale, however. Can anyone tell me who Helen shot at the end? It's driving me crazy'