A Raisin in the Sun Movie Review 1961
Amplified Tensions...
An insurance payout amplifies the tensions in a modest overcrowded apartment of a three generation family. The resulting misfortune and the prejudice suffered brings them closer. 1 of the best films ever fabricated, i of the best stories e'er told.
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The cast was usually amazing, in this simple, merely compelling story.
The actors in this movie are smashing actors. That could be said for every i of them. They all knew exactly what to practice with the script from their previous work on the stage play version. Unfortunately, when their face up is blown up 10 times on the big screen, so are their deportment, and some scenes, because of this, come off a picayune too over the top dramatic than they should be realistically. The story is a simple i, but actually pretty interesting, and most of the fourth dimension this is entertaining to watch.
The Younger family has only lost a member. Lena "Momma" Younger's (Claudia McNeil) husband died, and because of this the government is giving the family ten,000 dollars. Momma wants to purchase a house and motion the family out of their tiny apartment into a nice white neighborhood. Walter (Sidney Potier) has the dream of taking the money to showtime a liquor store. Beneatha (Diana Sands) wants to become to college on this coin. The family has issues, and though no real plot is apparent, the characters make the film.
The direction on this is nifty. The music only adds to it, and helps out greatly in scenes trying to be dramatic. The actors play the scenes off well usually, though as stated before, a few times they almost come up off campy instead of serious and dramatic. Well-nigh of the fourth dimension this wasn't the case though, and these actor'south performances shouldn't be nitpicked like I'm doing, and near won't even notice the over the top goofiness. The writing is very practiced, and is straight out of the play. The entertainment value is loftier, though some scenes seem to elevate, another meliorate scene generally follows.
Overall, this is not a masterpiece. The play is practiced, the acting is great, the cheese level is fairly low, and Raisin has a true human touch to information technology that makes the audience experience for these poor characters, and it's a very hard trait to emulate.
My rating: *** out of ****. 120 mins. PG for violence.
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Must see moving-picture show
"A Raisin in the Sun" is one of the finest American films ever made. This movie discusses many vital issues, such as racism, abortion, trust, family values, greed, and fifty-fifty disbelief.
My favorite character in this film is dame Lena Younger, impeccably performed by Claudia McNeil. Mrs. Younger is a wise, loving mother and grandmother to her family. While she may not always agree with her children's decisions, she never stops loving them.
Sidney Poitier is brilliant as the defeated Walter Lee Younger. Walter is frustrated with his task as a chauffeur, and believes he has more than to offer the globe.
Ruby Dee is great as Walter's supportive and level headed married woman.
The dialogue and bug that are discussed reinstate the values upon which America was built. I strongly recommend this excellent moving-picture show.
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An Underrated American Archetype
Some stories leave you shattered. They speak to you on such a level and yous identify with such intensity that by the cease of the picture, your nerves and emotion are raw.
Is Raisin in the Sun a play nearly racial prejudice? Yes indeed, an important one too. No story illustrates the ignorance of 'restricted neighborhoods' better. No film offers the ugliness of white airs and presumption, something that still lives and breathes in this country.
For me personally, this is also a motion picture about existence a human.
This picture show illustrates so well how men are composed. We honor the father, love the mother and protect the traditions that raised yous. Mixed in with all of that and no less important, are our dreams and aspirations.
This movie teaches us, with immense ability and clarity, that to be a man, to exist a existent man, you must never sell out your pride. Never. No matter how badly your dreams have been shattered, your pride and your manhood belong to no ane. Simple, basic redemption lies within that truth.
It's an important lesson, a deep lesson, that men of today (including myself) need to remind themselves of from time to time. At that place is a pride within all men. It can exist stubborn, it tin be arrogant and it can be so full of dreams that it can lead to bitter heartbreak. Simply it is there, called-for in all men and it'south our virtually treasured nugget.
I can't think of a contemporary play that illustrates more than strongly, the struggle and rites of manhood in American culture today. How ironic and perhaps appropriate that the moving-picture show is written by a woman. It is later all the women in this movie who patiently wait for Walter to discover himself. The love, faith and patience of the women in this film, illustrate the grace, power and importance women have in all our lives, regardless of our gender. A Raisin in the Sunday, is a marvelous picture and bright play. Information technology is, from my perspective, an American classic and I believe one of the almost underrated American plays of all fourth dimension. I recommend it to any man that is struggling to find themselves or trying to recapture what is real and what is untouchable within our souls and within our dreams.
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Reaching into the deepest depths of one's soul to justify existing.
Alert: Spoilers
It'south hard enough to make information technology in this world as a white man without money, let alone existence a black man on the outside looking in. For the superb Sidney Poitier, he's imploding within his insecurities of being a failure in the eyes of his family and be able to truthfully call himself a man. He's married to the difficult working Red Dee who loves him with all her soul, just a distance she doesn't understand has grown between them. Poitiers's sis (the enigmatic Diana Sands) is also striving to better herself, attending medical school and trying to "express herself" with a diverseness of hobbies she dumps once bored with them. A slap across the face from family unit matriarch Claudia McNeil after taking the Lord's proper name in vain merely briefly wakes her upwards. This is a black family in changing times losing their way, and it's up to the no-nonsense McNeil to bring them all back together.
Repeating her Broadway role and commanding every moment on screen, Claudia McNeil is award worthy as the centre and soul of her family unit. She loves her ii children unconditionally but no longer understands them. That's why she has made Dee her confidante and training to take over every bit head of the family. A scene where she sentimentally talks virtually her dead husband reveals the truth inside the soul, albeit the human being'southward imperfections, but loving him long later on he's dead just the same.
The plot line surrounds the fight over an insurance check McNeil is waiting for, with Poitier spending somebody else's money even before they get it. Poitier wants to purchase a liquor shop, while McNeil wants to buy a house so the family (which includes Poitier and Dee's immature son, Stephen Perry) can move out of the slums. Simply this creates many issues, not of which the least is the white neighbor's desperate attempts to prevent them f on moving in.
A timeless tale of how dreams exist in everybody's life, no affair the historic period, this has had two striking Broadway revivals since the beginning of the millennium, spawned an unofficial sequel ("Claybourne Park") and even been musicalized. It is a powerful character drama where a man is revealed to accept not really grown up, the women who strive to assistance him even when information technology seems that he's beyond aid. McNeil may not like what her children become, but her nurturing heart pulls the family together. A climactic breakdown in Poitiers's character may be the wake-up telephone call he needs to get a real man, only similar a wake-up call that sobers up a drunk. This is 1 of the all time classics and one that deserved more award attending in 1961 than information technology got.
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A shining example of a good play turn into a neat movie.
Warning: Spoilers
It's rare to come across a movie version of a motion-picture show, be as proficient as the play version, but 1961'southward 'A Raisin in the Sun' does that. Based on the play made in 1959 by an African-American playwright and painter Lorraine Hansberry. Raisin in the Sun was the first drama written past a black woman to be produced on Broadway. Young Lorraine grew up in a Chicago'south Woodlawn neighborhood and her own experiences atomic number 82 to the play's story. She got the championship of the play by finding it in a Langston Hughes's poem book 'Harlem' which is quotes in the poem 'A dream deferred'. The title, 'Raisin in the Sun' referred in the original poem about the hundreds of African American slaves that work in the hot sun in the cotton fields whom dream dry upward like a raisin. In the play and the movie, its symbolism the frustration of blacks working trying to make a better life for themselves, but in the end, their dream are forgotten or put off due to the mixer of racism and classism. The moving-picture show story is about a working-class family called the Youngers. Living in a lousy apartment for decades, they want to and wish to leave the place behind. The central thought of the play is concerned with fighting off the myth of black contentment. Information technology shows the stress of being in poverty when the large family unit is crammed into a pocket-size apartment. The plot get going when the family finds out that Lena AKA Mama (Claudia McNeil) got an insurance check for $10,000. Each members of the family discover themselves having their own version of what to do with an insurance check. Walter Lee (Sidney Poitler) a poor chauffeur, dreams of making a fortune past investing the money in a liquor business against the wishes of both his wife and the mother. Sidney Poitler does a smashing job equally Walter. Information technology'due south one of his best roles in my opinion. You can run across the want in his optics. The pain, he goes through when it doesn't come his way. Powerful. Beneatha (Diana Sands), his flighty college student sister too wants the money so that she can exist a md and alive in Africa with one of her 2 boyfriends. Ane is a boy, George Murchison (Louis Gossett), a wealthy Negro concerned with appearances and cloth, while the 2nd, Joseph Asagai (Ivan Dixon), is a native African that inspires her intellectually and spiritually. Not bad symbolism with Beneatha's pilus in the pic. When the moving picture begins, Beneatha has straightened pilus. Midway through the play, subsequently Asagai visits her and questions her hairstyle, she cuts her Caucasian-seeming pilus for the new radical afro represents her embracing of her African heritage. Beneatha's cutting of her hair is a very powerful social statement in the 1960's, every bit she symbolically declares that natural black is beautiful and wouldn't conform to the mode society dictates at the time. It'southward get a symbol of her anti-assimilationist beliefs. The flick dealt with the talk about racism, not only with whites and blacks, simply also black against black. One of the outset major allusions to any sort of racism appears with the character of George Murchison. When the wealthy George enters the pic, the Younger family sees the differences in race and grouped him with snobbish white people. Mama dreams of buying a home in all-white neighborhood with her coin, but fears that they would be faced with racist neighbors, and people trying to buy them out to forbid the neighborhood's integration. One such person trying to buy them out is Karl Aka Marking Linder (John Fielder) whom openly states the racism present in the neighborhood that Mama wants to live. While he at beginning sugarcoats his words, he tells the Youngers that they are not wanted in the neighborhood because they are Negroes. Mama's choice soon become troublesome, as one choice tin can pb them into deeply poverty or conservancy. A Raisin in the Sunday is essentially well-nigh dreams, as the master characters struggle to deal with the oppressive circumstances that dominion their lives, both with happiness and depression. The movie follows a skillful amount of themes such as the need to fight racial discrimination in a powerfully demonstrates of the family unit strength. By having a strong family, it shows that the African American community, that the importance of family is key to success. I peachy thing near the movie is how little, they change from the play. About of the film takes identify in the home. Was the bar scene really needed? Not really, the producers could had shown Walter's alcoholic nature, but with him coming home with a canteen, and we would get the aforementioned results. But past showing the audience how cramped the flat is, we get how badly they are struggling. Plus, it's nice to see a flick with few cuts scenes. Managing director Daniel Petrie did a smashing chore. I would had love to see more of Mama's establish. In the play, Mama's constitute represents both Mama's intendance and her dream for her family. Withal, the movie does a peachy job with dealing with other bug, such equally abortion, greed, and the lack of organized religion. The picture show follows the play very well. While, 2008's TV movie 'A Raisin in the Lord's day' does a good task every bit well. It's doesn't beat this movie by acting standards and scene commitment. While, 1 might label this as a 'black people' flick, I found its subject affair, universal. I think this film dealt with everything whatsoever common folk might accept to deal with, and that's why I think the movie is so well-fabricated.
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Incredible acting
When you rent A Raisin in the Sun, get set up for some seriously intense interim and a beautiful script. Commonly, when a movie is fabricated of a play, one or ii members of the Broadway cast are used, and the rest is filled with Hollywood names. In Daniel Petrie's adaptation of Lorraine Hansberry's play, almost everyone in the 1959 original Broadway cast reprised their roles on film. And, while Sidney Poitier and Claudia McNeil, besides every bit the direction and play itself, were nominated for Tonys, the film was universally ignored at the Oscars.
In a minor apartment that doesn't even take a bathroom, in that location lives the widowed Claudia McNeil, her son Sidney Poitier, her daughter Diana Sands, and Sidney's wife Ruby Dee. They're all dissatisfied with their lives, but each family unit member deals with their disappointment and frustration in different ways. Sidney throws his centre into untrustworthy schemes, Diana is studying to become a doc to better herself, Ruby keeps her caput down every bit she tries to get through each solar day, and Claudia tries to continue mothering her grown children.
Different near plays, A Raisin in the Sun isn't overly wordy, and not a single moment is boring. Information technology's terribly sad, but still a fleck optimistic at times, and very thought-provoking. Perhaps my favorite element, besides the superbly center-wrenching performances of Sidney and Claudia, is the character development in the script. Every single person in the story is three-dimensional, and no one is a villain or a saint. Audiences tin can understand their thought-processes and motivations, and it's nearly impossible to cull a favorite grapheme. Depending on how well yous handle deplorable stories, this might be a staple you add to your drove, or it might be a film you watch only one time merely recall forever.
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Very moving
Sidney Poitier'due south A Raisin in the Sun exceeded my high hopes. Hands a ten/10 film, it is and then very touching and uplifting with great characters and groovy performances. Humorous, too! This film delivers in a major way.
Ideally, a film should accept something intelligent to say nearly life, well-nigh reality. A Raisin in the Sun is such a motion-picture show and more than. And so, if the reality of human life in full general interests you, consider yourself well-brash to watch this powerful film. I have little doubt that you will enjoy it.
It is, as of this posting, number 34 on my top 250.
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The Younger Family Of The South Side Of Chicago
The tragically brief life of Lorraine Hansberry yielded a few literary gems among them A Raisin In The Sun, the first play on Broadway e'er written by a black woman. Although Hansberry's childhood was a great deal more middle class than that of the Younger family who is the subject of the play, she captures the black urban feel of the ceremonious rights era brilliantly. Some of the things written in A Raisin In The Dominicus were experienced by Hansberry personally, most specially her own family unit'south struggle to move into the white suburbs.
Columbia Pictures had the expert sense to hire Lorraine Hansberry to write the screenplay and catechumen her play which all takes identify in the Younger family unit apartment in the south side of Chicago for the screen. In that location are a few brief scenes added outside the apartment. But what actually holds the interest is the dialog between the iv main characters in the apartment. It'due south a lot like Eugene O'Neill's Long Day'southward Journeying Into Night with souls laid bare. The apartment itself almost becomes a character, a home but also the symbol of a kind of prison the Youngers desire to suspension out of.
The four main characters are Walter Younger, Jr., his wife Ruth, his sister Berneatha, and mother Lena, played past Sidney Poitier, Cerise Dee, Diana Sands, and Claudia McNeil respectively who all came over from Broadway. Through McNeil's functioning specially, but the others equally well, the family patriarch Walter Younger besides comes alive. What has happened is that he has recently died and the family is awaiting a $10,000.00 insurance check, courtesy of his years of service with the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the kickoff primarily black wedlock to organize in the USA.
Poitier is working equally a chauffeur, both Dee and McNeil work and have worked every bit domestics, Sands is a young higher student with the ideas of her fourth dimension, simply she's besides been spoiled a whole lot. Each has their own idea of what to exercise with the insurance coin. The conflict and what eventually does happen divides and and then unites the family in the stop.
A Raisin In The Sunday ran for 530 performances on Broadway during the 1959-60 season and earned a flock of Tony Honor nominations including All-time Actor for Poitier and Best Actress for McNeil. Coming out as it did during the Civil Rights era information technology was equally timely a literary masterpiece equally there ever was. When it ended its Broadway run, film production with merely nearly the entire cast from Broadway commenced.
A couple of other players who would make their marks subsequently were in A Raisin In The Sun. Lou Gossett, Jr. years earlier his Oscar plays a young and naive higher kid who is interested in Sands. But she's far more than interested in Ivan Dixon who is from Nigeria way before he joined the bandage of Hogan's Heroes.
Though information technology is firmly gear up in the times information technology was written in, as drama A Raisin In The Sun is positively eternal. Information technology'southward as flawless a transfer from stage to movie as you'll always run into.
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Masterpiece
Diary entry 1996:
For decades I have been waiting for American TV to run into fit to exhibit the picture show version of "A Raisin in the Sun". The day volition never come. So I grabbed the opportunity to bank check out the video from the library. I didn't wait to be moved as much as I was when I showtime saw the TV play. Afterwards all, I knew the plot. The novelty effect was no longer there. Yet I was tearful throughout the picture show, and was wiping away tears for the last half hour. There are wonderful lines like "Seems God saw fit to give the blackness man nothing merely dreams - but He sure saw fit to give'em children to make the dream seem worthwhile". "A raisin in the Sun" is not just the greatest movie drama, but also the greatest American play. This play transcends race and addresses universal issues. It combines drama with sense of humour with beauteous balance.
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One of the all-time films e'er fabricated
I sentinel this film with my children, to show them that although in that location are no special furnishings, no explicit sexual activity scences, and very lilliputian profane language this is a picture show that GRABS you from kickoff to terminate. It breaks beyond race and colour, information technology is virtually HUMANITY. Sidney and Cherry-red are BRILLIANT in this film, but the accolades belong to the grandmother. She is the Rock that holds everything together. I urge everyone to watch this movie. EVERYTIME I Spotter IT I CRY.
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Powerful performances
"A Raisin in the Sun" presents powerful acting performances from Sidney Poitier, Ruby Dee, and Claudia MacNeil. I was securely engaged throughout the film due to the fine presence of the characters and meaningful dialogue. The conversations between the members in the Younger family reveal not but their unique personalities and dreams, but too, the complex nature of their relationships and the deep personal issues inside each of them. Someone in one case said, "pride is a dangerous thing" and this film beautifully illustrates the consequences of pride. In my opinion, this is ane of Poitier'south finest moments in picture show just, more than importantly, I believe this story offers a lesson to all of us, regardless of race, about beloved and pride. It is truly a archetype film.
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Powerful and profound, merely takes forever to make its point - overwrought and unnecessarily protracted
The Younger family unit are a working class black family unit with three generations, 5 people, living in a cramped flat. However, it appears their fortunes are most to change as grandmother Younger is about to receive a big insurance payout. Nevertheless, in that location is considerable disagreement within the household on how the money will be spent, resulting in friction within the Younger family.
Powerful and profound, but takes forever to make its indicate - overwrought and unnecessarily protracted. The ultimate theme is very admirable, and very necessary, especially in the 1960s. Well gear up too, in getting to the punchline.
Too well set up. You have to wait for about ninety minutes for annihilation like a degree of focus or for a payoff for everything that came earlier. Until then the moving picture seemed to drift.
Worst of all, the dialogue is incredibly padded. The writer's reasoning seemed to be - why use x words when 100 volition do? Every bit of dialogue is long-winded and feels like a speech, enough to make even Shakespeare seem succinct. And then many times I defenseless myself thinking "Geez, just get to the point!".
Some brevity and this would accept been a superb picture. Instead it is a flake of an ordeal, with a good payoff at the cease.
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The Greatest Story E'er Told
This is the embodiment of the Mr. Langston Hughes poem that manifestly inspired Ms. Lorraine Hansberry to write this wonderful piece. What indeed DOES happen to a dream deferred? Each of the adult chief characters has a dream about what should exist done with the $10,000 insurance policy paid afterward the Younger patriarch'southward expiry, and each person's dream is challenged. I nearly place with the graphic symbol of Beneatha, the doctor-to-exist in a time when few women, and even fewer Black women, could accomplish this dream. This is a story of dreams, of family, of strength, of sacrifice, of mistakes and of recovery from the consequences of those mistakes. Whenever I need a dose of inspiration, when things in my own life seem too hard to conquer, I watch A Raisin in the Sun and feel strong over again. The acting in this picture show is so incredibly moving that there are parts (and I won't give them away) that are and then disheartening and sad that they still move me to tears, afterward all these years and afterwards all the times I have watched it. It is truly the greatest story ever told.
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of import blackness picture palace
Walter Lee Younger (Sidney Poitier) is a chauffeur feeling under the pollex of the ladies in his life. His wife Ruth (Ruby Dee) is meaning and because an abortion. His mother and sister Beneatha are also living with them in their apartment in Chicago's south side. His male parent is recently deceased and his mama is expecting a big insurance bank check. Walter expects to utilise the coin to buy a liquor shop but his female parent has other thoughts. His sister wants to pay for her education. She has a fight with mama over religion. She brings dwelling house Nigerian Asagai who introduces her to Nigerian culture. Her integrated swain George Murchison (Louis Gossett Jr.) is dismissive of whatsoever old globe culture. Mama buys a house in a white neighborhood to endeavour to pull the family unit dorsum together. Mark Lindner comes to offer to buy it back to avoid racial tension.
This is an important black play and an of import blackness pic. At that place are a lot of family conflicts in this story. Some of it feels like piling on especially the ballgame question. I would like a more elementary argument about money. I am also not impressed with Sidney Poitier. He's being whiny. Perhaps he is intended to be whiny only information technology would be improve as frustrated acrimony. For me, the standout is Claudia McNeil playing the mother. She is both powerful and powerless over her children. She is playing on several different levels. The sister also feels whiny but she'due south younger and it fits more her blood brother. There are some interesting work here and an important message in the cease.
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The Pioneer of 'Black Angry' Movie theatre...
"A Raisin in the Sun" is one of these works whose relevance transcend times and can exist adapted to any specific menses without losing its power. The film started equally a successful Broadway play, written by Lorraine Hapsberry, so adapted in 1961 by Daniel Petrie and revived so regularly that each generation of viewer would be familiar with the struggles of an boilerplate Black family in that piece of American history.
And struggle isn't simply an understatement, it's the whole overarching theme that makes each step frontward a conquest of its ain, and each failure feel like x slaps on the face. Everything is hyperbolized because nothing that happens is an isolated event but the last of a streak of misfortunes that kept irrigating hearts with streams of frustration.
Nothing is random but rather obeys to a systemic scheme where you've got no upper hand. And and so "A Raisin in the Sun" handles topics such every bit absorption, housing, racism, money, family all with the swiftness of a juggler, becoming the consummate African-American family unit drama, centering on the Youngers: average people try to overcome poverty and still have inner demons to fight and settle a few records in the process.
Naturally such a film had to feature Poitier who starred in many entries of AFI Acme 100 Thank you such as "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner", "The Defiant Ones", "In the Heat of the Night" and "Lilies of the Field". Merely there's also Ruby Dee, playing his married woman Ruth, and who was one of Spike Lee darlings and correct me if I'1000 incorrect, only in that location'southward a kinship between this film and the Lee joint tone, full of angst, anger and passion. And I'm glad I could observe Dee in a younger role (no pun intended).
I didn't know about the author who sadly passed away shortly after the play, but if in that location's one affair the motion picture taught me is that nothing ever comes likewise late. Some fathers become men at 35, some families get a condition after v generations, time is all relative a notion when it comes to conciliate between the burdens of the past and the dreams of a brighter future. And if Black people weren't on equal footing with White, they weren't on equal levels of thinking together, and Hapsberry pioneering all the Fasten Lee and Lees and August Wilsons allowed every bit many voices to raise, making in the cacophony the kind of chaos from which the calorie-free of truth could sally.
Poitier is Walter Lee Younger, he works equally a limousine chauffeur and he'south had enough existence surrounded by exterior signs of wealth, he wants his slice of the American dream though a share on the insurance money his female parent Lena will benefit from after her husband's decease. Ruth, his married woman, is the hard-working housekeeper (keeping other houses make ends see) and is exhausted past the sight of her husband so wrapped up in his liquor-store project he doesn't offer the illusion of steadiness she needs. Besides, Walter blames her for never showing the true back up he deserves. Information technology's the marital dead-end.
Beneatha (Diane Sands) is the sister who wants to enter pre-med school, like Walter, her reach is across the usual standards of appetite and she counts on the insurance money likewise. Beneatha represents the new generation, torn between two paths incarnated by her boyfriends: Joseph Asagai (Ivan Dixon) a Nigerian student who offers her traditional clothes and enlightens her about her roots and George (a young unrecognizable Louis Gossett Jr.) who's the clean-cutting incarnation of assimilation. Beneatha is also a proud atheist, which shows that she not only rejecting white values. In one of the flick's memorable scenes, her mother slaps her and forces her to say that in this house "there'southward God".
That'southward Claudia McNeil as Lena, the freshly widowed matriarch, who represents the "typical" old generation and the film'due south soul, literally. Lena believes in God, she'south got values and she abides by a certain model incarnated by the past. The begetter is that past 'ghost' whose death acted more every bit a blessing than a curse, which says a lot, and to honor his retention, Lena would never have any of the values he incarnated (hard work, resignation, nobility) being tarnished past her daughter's atheisms or her son'south sleazy dreams. Everyone but Lena is so wrapped up in individuality that Walter himself isn't surprised when Ruth contemplates abortion..
One thing that hits you as soon equally the moving-picture show starts is that all these people take their issues and didn't expect for any exposition. They're real, complex, and full of resentment they're characters of pure flesh defined by what they dream of, and what they couldn't reach and what they could. Observe that once the grandmother decides to purchase a house to her grandson, Ruth'south confront instantly shines and it's as if her troubles were over, there'south no disharmonize for the sake of information technology. The real issue is between Walter and Lena about the pregnant of leading a family : is information technology to provide value or money? Information technology's all in this equation... and when Marking Lindner (John Fiedler) the faux affably suave neighborhood representative offers to buy them out of the 'white' neighborhood to avoid tension, they realize that the globe is so bedridden that money tin buy you new problems.
At that place are many layers in the film, served by and then many powerful acting performances, Poitier is given these occasions to show how vehemently passionate he is, his furor about turns into a frantic dance while Lena keeps a straight face expressing with her eyes her shame cloy or pride. It's a film shot in very confined area that betray its theatrical origin simply still, yous never feel like people interim but rather interacting and struggling to find a sheet of communication, and when reason fails, dancing, gesticulating, crying are options even the sanest of us can't resist... when we've been waiting for that break for years... or centuries...
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Well-acted, topical family drama
3 generations of a struggling black family living in a minor Chicago apartment in a deal with a sudden financial windfall. Based on Lorraine Hansberry'southward ground breaking play and starring most of the stage bandage, "Raisin in the Dominicus" is a poignant portrayal of alien values and hopes in poor family unit, both between generations and between genders. Sidney Portier is excellent equally Walter, a young father who feels trapped in a servile and dead-end job who sees the insurance payout as an opportunity to go into business, as is Claudia McNeil equally his mother, the beneficiary of the settlement who dreams of buying a business firm for her family. McNeil also brings the perspective of the struggles and sacrifices that brought the family to their pocket-size but dignified lives and who bristles when the younger children complain most their lot. Diana Sands is as well very good as daughter Beneatha, a university student for whom the settlement would cover medical school tuition. Beneatha also represents the growing interest of black youth in racial-politics and interests in their African origins. Ruby Dee rounds out the bandage as Walters' meaning and drastic wife. The story is driven by the alien values of the characters with some references to the external issues, such as racism (as personified by a community representative (John Fiedler) who tries to convince the family not to move into his neighbourhood). For a story dealing with such sensitive and politicised issues, the film is refreshingly not heavy-handed, preachy, or self-righteous. I am very much an outsider with respect to the film but plant information technology entertaining, idea-provoking, and very well done.
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A Picture of Pain
Warning: Spoilers
This was a heavy movie. The emotion, the pain, the angst, the anger--it was all on full display.
Walter Lee Younger (Sidney Poitier) was an aroused Black man merely not the militant angry kind merely the defeated angry kind. He was cooped up in a one-bedroom apartment with his wife, son, female parent, and sis. He had aught going for him except a menial chauffer job and he was aroused almost it. He was aroused at everyone.
He saw his only run a risk at happiness was to invest in a bar with 2 of his friends, Willie and Bobo. If only his mother would give him the $ten,000 insurance check from his male parent'southward death, then he could live loftier on the pig and so could his family unit. There was one trouble with that dream: his mother wanted to use some of that money for his sister's education and she certainly wasn't going to use it to help him get a liquor license.
I thought it was telling that Walter only showed life and happiness once his mother entrusted him with the remaining money after her down payment for a house. It was sickening and sad how securely his happiness was tied to money. The prospect of him non being able to chase his dream of owning a watering hole sent him spiraling into a self-destructive path of depression. The only one prophylactic from his wrath was his son Travis (Steven Perry).
Walter disgusted me whereas his mother Lena (Claudia McNeil) was everything Walter wasn't. She was strong, she was a rock, and she was firmly grounded. Even when Walter lost all the coin they had left she was a picture of poise while Walter liquified into a puddle of self-compassion.
In that location was some powerful dialog in this moving picture and a lot to digest. At one point it was so thick with anybody's issues I idea that they would dice from the heavy hearts and burdens they were all carrying. This was a serious movie--not one you can blithely sit downwards and enjoy. This movie takes the proper mindset and emotional state. I wasn't ready. Information technology hit me hard and barely let up. Fifty-fifty when it ended I remarked, "This is certainly not happily ever after. Their problems are but kickoff."
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Superb, Way alee of its fourth dimension
Brilliant performances all around. Amazing how far alee this movie must accept been in 1961. Watching it now it boggles my mind that these bug made information technology to movie theatre.
Poiter is GOD and has such a stage presence that it is no wonder he is such a gifted actor. Truly Bright film.
Rating ten out of 10
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What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry out up, like a raisin in the sunday?
Alert: Spoilers
Lorraine Hansberry'southward screen adaptation of her own phase play is a powerful depiction of a black family unit's attempts to drag itself out of the ghetto with the assistance of a $ten,000 insurance pay-out following the death of the father. However, instead of providing the answer to their problems, information technology creates a new fix that threatens to tear them autonomously.
Sidney Poitier got himself noticed with this flick, and information technology's not hard to see why. While it wasn't his breakthrough motion-picture show – he'd been around for years, and had co-starred with Curtis in The Defiant Ones a couple of years before – it was the moving picture that led to him obtaining starring roles rather than supporting ones. He brings an exuberance to the screen hither that few actors can lucifer, and stalks the cramped set like a panther as he rages against his lot in life. His isn't a likable graphic symbol, and yet it's a measure out of Poitier'south talent that, even though he tends to overact at times, he still manages to make the character a sympathetic one. Claudia McNeil, reprising her stage role, vies with Poitier for domination of the screen at times, but it is a contest that benefits the film rather than creating conflict, and both Ruddy Dee as Poitier's long-suffering wife and the ill-fated Diana Sands equally his feisty sis are overshadowed past the principle actors' performances.
Films like this require a level of compromise on the role of the viewer than doesn't come like shooting fish in a barrel to me. While the flick itself is undeniably powerful and the rare quality of the writing can't exist faulted, the relentless emoting and dramatic expression of deceptively complex themes and ideas begin to wear 1 down after a while. Past their very nature they can only fail to exist representative of the people they draw because the ideas expressed are rarely more than than passing observations to those who do not devote the deep thought to such matters that are necessary for the creation of such a literate slice of work. In fact, praise of the writing in a play/movie like this is a double-edged sword when you recall almost it: the 'real' people represented past the Youngers may feel trapped in the same style as Hansberry'southward characters, but it's unlikely that they would be able to articulate their feelings in the way the Youngers do. In this sense then, such films are unrealistic, and also often the ultimate nobility of the characters – as witnessed in the concluding scenes in A Raisin In The Sunday – fails to ring true. There are few people who would have non taken the white racist's money when faced with the hardship that the Youngers are most to suffer, and it would be the easiest affair in the world for anyone to convincingly justify such an human activity. Perchance that'south simply a sign of the changing times, but something tells me otherwise, and for that reason, Walter'southward change of eye fails to convince. But then if he didn't accept a modify of center, what kind of pic – and bulletin – would we be left with?
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All-time Blackness Picture palace Ever
My applause goes to director, Daniel Petrie, for a masterpiece motion-picture show that concentrated on one set of a black family's small apartment, in the projects of Chicago. This movie shows every hardship that black families went through in the fifties. A Raisin in the Sun movie is a remake of Lorraine Hansberry's archetype stage play of how a black family tries to escape from their crowded apartment life to a house in an all white neighborhood. Sidney Politer delivered his usual outstanding performance in this film, which sends a message about the limited opportunities open to blacks in this time period. My favorite character was Mama, played by Claudia McNeil. She did an excellent chore showing how the mother is always the backbone of black families through every trial and tribulation. I am non usually a fan of black and white movies, only this film displayed a wonderful storyline for me to understand the struggle they went through. At that place was never a movie that I tin can think of that was this excellent with ane ready near of the flick and was in blackness and white. The function of the movie that meant a lot to me is how Mama took the money she received and did something with information technology that would benefit the whole family. Overall, each main grapheme portrayed a strong black person. For example, Walter Lee realized that he is suppose to follow backside his father and be a potent black man and enhance a family. Ruth always stood by her husband no matter his wrongs, Beneatha was a young black pupil going to higher to be doctor and Mama was just their for any of her family member'south and remain strong for everyone.
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"Kinda like a rainbow subsequently the rain..."
Yeah, there are some corny platitudes in this one, and information technology's a deliberately forced, theatrical melodrama. Non only that merely you might exist constantly distracted by Claudia McNeil's resemblance to the boxer James Toney.
Nevertheless, the intentionally fix-leap, stage-like piece of work contains a mesmerising intensity throughout, an virtually uncomfortable two hours of naked emotion on screen.
Cinematography and cast are both pretty much showtime-charge per unit in a screenplay that seems to have i too many points to make, but manages to necktie them all together by the picture show'southward finish.
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well written and relevant to today...
The American dream,and the loss of information technology, this flick is relevant on many levels, dealing with financial strife,racism,dis-equity among working classes.It is more relevant even today, every bit people in America are seeing their houses devalued,loss of once stable jobs,and the struggle to endure.
Claudia McNair is just superb as the grandmother, and glue which holds the family together. Sidney Poitier is Walter Lee, who is stocking all of his hopes in the ten,000.00 his mother is getting, from the deceased fathers life insurance policy.
Beneatha is the younger sis, attending premed in college with her own dreams and aspirations, which her female parent and sister-in-constabulary Ruth (superb performance by Ruddy Dee), have difficulty understanding. A related scene when they burst out laughing equally Beneatha takes up yet another hobby to express herself,the women's issues that were at the forefront during the 1950's and 1960'south are evinced, every bit well as the racism issues,and diff handling.
An odious role with John Fiedler as a racist member of the Klyburn Park Homeowners Association,trying to pay off the family to not buy a house in his neighborhood.
Overall excellent performance by Poitier as a fellow trying to make his marker in a hostile society,this movie is archetype,must meet.10/10.
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Rights of Dreams
Alarm: Spoilers
RAISIN IN THE Sun (1961), was similar THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES (1945) and CITIZEN KANE (1941). It was always on Beak KENNEDY AT THE MOVIES on Aqueduct Nine here in Detroit. While my Begetter was putting downward drib cloths and painting our rooms upstairs, I would skip downstairs in and out of the basement and catch snippets of it here and there between glasses of Kool-Aid and tuna fish sandwiches and playing Baseball. Of form it was considered a classic dorsum then, and rightfully then. But being nothing only a kid dorsum then, my idols were Jesse Owens and Willie Mays, and RAISIN IN THE SUN was too much Big Mama and indoorsy Cartoon Room drama for somebody like me who simply wanted more Baseball.
Equally I grew older, I appreciated more what RAISIN IN THE Lord's day had to offering in illuminating the African American feel. Sort of in the same style I grew to capeesh MACBETH and Village and JULIUS CEASAR, and stopped wondering why these dramas were on television so often. Forgive me if I even so see RAISIN as essentially a woman's play, written masterfully by a adult female with three of the strongest characters being women. Claudia McNeil as Lena Younger, is a paragon and archetype of feminine strength. She was a neat extra, easily the equal of Ethel Barrymore or Margaret Rutherford, and her talent would accept probably been more greatly appreciated in a wider diversity of roles. We knew Blood-red Dee from her stint every bit Harriet Tubman on THE GREAT Risk; an American History Anthology Boob tube series of the early 1960's, forth with her husband Ossie Davis. She too was a smashing actress in films like NO Mode OUT (1950), where her husband Ossie Davis again starred with her alongside Sidney Poitier. I also call up her more vividly from THE JACKIE ROBINSON STORY, naturally because it was all most Baseball game and a Blackness Human being breaking into the Major Leagues. Simply hers was every bit distinguished a career equally many actresses thanks to she and her husband's association with Spike Lee where they did some of their best work. I find information technology hard to imagine anyone playing Ruth Younger better than Reddish Dee. Finally, there is Diana Sands, who plays Beneatha Younger. She was an acclaimed Tony and Emmy nominated actress, noted for her work on phase and in film.
At present, I realize equally I write this, nosotros are talking about three Queens of Drama, equally much as I was considering three Kings of One-act when I did my review for HARLEM NIGHTS (1989). Naturally, posterity recognizes their piece of work as the beleaguered women of the Younger Family. Claudia McNeil as Lena Younger, the matriarchal foundation of the family unit, upholding its time honored traditions and workable truths. Ruby-red Dee as Ruth Younger, feeling the walls closing in on her and simply wanting more room and sunlight than their cramped apartment on the s side of Chicago has to offer. Diana Sands as Beneatha Younger, an intelligent young woman adamant to become a Doctor, who has her choice between 2 suitors, i whom she considers an imitation White Man and the other who fancies himself an African Prince destined to sweep her away across the ocean to the Motherland.
That'due south not to say that the men are any slouches in this drama. Sidney Poitier equally Walter Lee Younger brings a catlike physical grace to the role that is a plus for this cinematic offspring of the play. This Chicago chauffeur with his dreams of running his own business has a visual dynamism that about leaps out of the screen. Ivan Dixon as Joseph Asagi, is dignified and reserved as he offers his own oblique observations on how oppression and exploitation has arrested the development of this African American family. Louis Gossett Jr., as George Murchison plying as well for the hand of Beneatha with Asagi, seems SHORT, and petty and mean, and you take to look shut to see that he is actually taller than Sidney Poitier at half-dozen feet and four inches! Quite a feat for an role player. Joel Fluellen equally Bobo also delivers equally he poignantly conveys, forth with Poitier, the ache of Black Men attempting to make a mark for themselves in a world where all the rules are written by those who consider them nothing more than than hired help.
I was fortunate enough to get a documentary record of RAISIN IN THE SUN when I was in my twenties. At that fourth dimension, for the stage version that these records recorded, Ossie Davis played the lead function of Walter Lee Younger. I studied it the mode you would study SPORTSMANLIKE DRIVING or the Bible. One thing I realized was that on the stage the human phonation is the prime number carrier wave of the emotional content of the drama, whereas in cinema it is physical motion. I can still hear Ossie Davis' vocalization thrilling and arousing the audition in that documentary tape, simply as I can vividly see Sidney Poitier spilling off the table in his living room, overcome with the intoxication of pride every bit he celebrates the greatest of the times.
Special notice should also go to John Fiedler as Marker Lindner, who bears the cantankerous equally the white token in a drama for once. Representing the Clybourne Park Improvement Association, he comes beyond convincingly as a nervous, frightened picayune man, who wants no trouble in his neighborhood, and timorously offers the Youngers a financial mode out of his discomfort. Yous will call up him, perhaps, as just equally effective and even brilliant in his plow as one of the jurors in TWELVE Angry MEN (1957).
There have been other moving picture versions of this play, and you would probably do well to study them all for purposes of comparing and contrast. Every bit for myself, I'll park this one as a keeper where Lorraine Hansberry has done the screenplay and provided the camera instructions for David Susskind. This is a worthy story of an African American Family making their Stride Toward Freedom and discovering what it ways to exist Immature, Gifted and Black.
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