1961 Directed by Daniel Petrie
Walter Lee Younger is a young man struggling with his station in life. Sharing a tiny apartment with his wife, son, sister and mother, he seems like an imprisoned man. Until, that is, the family gets an unexpected financial windfall.
Un lunar en el sol, Rodzynek w sloncu, A napfény nem eladó, O Sol Tornará a Brilhar, Ena stafyli ston ilio, Sort solskin, Särkynyt illuusio, Un Grappolo di sole, El sol brilla para todos, Un raisin au soleil, 태양의 계절
Cinematic Time Capsule
1961 Marathon - Film #11`
”Nobody in this house is ever gonna understand me.”
Brilliant writing and performing from a special era when those words really meant something. This is an incredible stage-play presented as a film, but just magine what it would have been like to see this script and these actors live on a stage. Electric.
By the way. is there anything more disconcerting and awkward than hearing Piglet say, “you people” over and over again?
”I’m sorry it went like this…”
“Just… leave.”
This film adaptation of Lorraine Hansberry's play is not one that feels far to distant from its theatrical roots - and although Daniel Petrie's adaptation is one that exemplifies that quality above all else, it still reaffirms the resonance left behind by the original play.
In telling the story of a struggle faced by an African-American family, what makes Petrie's cinematic take on A Raisin in the Sun work its wonders can be felt through how the cast (the same people who had performed these characters onstage) puts their life into every role. Every member of the Younger family feels like you've known them so closely, but it also helps that you can still feel the claustrophobia present within the…
I don't think enough can be said about this film. It is superb.
Extremely powerful and moving. This is a must see.
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.Or does it explode?
- Harlem, Langston Hughes.
Very special, very important and still just as relevant today, A Raisin in the Sun is the perfect transposition from stage to screen of Lorraine Hansberry's Pulitzer prize winning play of the same name, a production that was the first play written by an African American woman to appear on Broadway and by retaining much of the cast of the original show, as well as…
Deadly Sin #2 Greed in the Fourth Circle of Hell (Greed)
They are divided into two groups – those who hoarded possessions and those who lavishly spent it.
New Deadly Sin #8 Prejudice in the Seventh Circle of Hell (Violence)
Divided into three rings. The Outer Ring houses murderers and others who were violent to other people and property. In the Middle Ring, suicides who have been turned into trees and bushes which are fed upon by harpies. Also there are profligates, chased and torn to pieces by dogs. In the Inner Ring are blasphemers, residing in a desert of burning sand and burning rain falling from the sky.
As Rod Serling once said:
"There are weapons that are simply…
I wasn't so sure I was going to like Sidney Poitier as Walter Younger. From my experience of Poitier's acting, which admittedly is still from just a small fraction of his body of work, he usually plays characters that are subdued, as well as playing largely very likable characters. I wasn't concerned about him playing a more morally complex character, one who unintentionally becomes his family's antagonist (though let's be clear the real antagonist of A Raisin in the Sun is racism, capitalism, and how they intersect in the lie of the American Dream). I just wasn't sure Poitier would work in such a physical and manic part. As the film progressed, I realized how wrong I was. I have…
Every family goes through their share of problems. The entire cast is heartbreaking. The scary part is that racial prejudice continues to exist.
Having fallen in love with A Patch of Blue a few months ago and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner just the night before, I was extremely excited to watch another critically acclaimed Poitier film, this time with A Raisin in the Sun. As you can see from my rating, I did not enjoy it as much as others.
My main problems with the film come from its conception. Having been originally a play Poitier starred in, the film stays a little too true to the format. One of the great things about a play is that performances will differ nightly and you never know what could happen. But with a movie version, you have to…
"I sure hope you people know what you're doing"
One of those movies I'd never seen and should have watched a while ago--Daniel Petrie makes effective use of space--keeps the Younger's apartment claustrophobic and full of comings and goings enough so that any time the film escapes it (or even pans around to show clothes drying in the alley outside) it's a genuine shock----it's very clearly a movie-as-filmed-play, with a lot of conversations and speeches given by characters moving to front and center as other characters stare at them from the background, but Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil and Ruby Dee are terrific enough that it doesn't really matter, and the film's slow build pays off in the second half with…
