Burning Cane

Great movie! It was slow but it did hold my attention. This movie is very realistic and powerful. There is the struggle between religion and coping with demons in movie, which some people deal with in this world. Kudos to the young director who put this movie together. I look forward to seeing more of his work.

A very slow moving movie, the hand held camera shots gave it a home-made feel but this style was delivered at the expense of any substance. With a drunk pastor, lots of drinking and smoking, you wondered just what message it was aiming to deliver. Fortunately the Blues backing soundtrack and the gospel singing was great. Not enough to save the movie that was in the end, just a little dull.

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.

"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.

...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.