The action of the film takes place in 1943. The title character is a cosmopolitan and incapable of deeper feelings seducer. In Poland, he lost his entire family. Alone - being in the heart of Nazi Germany - he hides his Jewish origins and often eludes death. He works as a waiter in the restaurant of an exclusive hotel and carelessly enjoys all the charms of life surrounded by luxury, beautiful women and friends from all over Europe. However, when the war begins to take a bloody toll on those closest to him, the intricately built world that surrounds him crumbles like a house of cards.
Charles Burnett, one of America's most highly regarded independent filmmakers, wrote and directed this domestic drama about a black middle-class family living in South central Los Angeles. However, there are no gangs, no guns, no drugs but instead a lyrical story that draws on folklore and the supernatural.
family tensions are already simmering when Harry (Danny Glover) arrives to visit his old friends. He exudes an easy charm, knows secret past and present and is soon installed in the heart of the family. However, as his stay lengthens, so does he begin to cast an even more malevolent spell, provoking turmoil, setting son against son, reviving past hatreds, and inflicting a mysterious illness.
Glover delivers a career-topping performance as the garrulous family friend, full of hidden menace, effortlessly evoking nostalgia and horror in the same breath.
As ever, Burnett provides a wonderful music track featuring gospel, blues and jazz and a cameo from the legendary Jimmy Weatherspoon.
'A slow-burning, soul-insinuating, 12-bar blues of a movie.' Tom Charity, Time Out
'Danny Glover is marvellous, and terrifying, as a charismatic old-timer.' The Times
(from the description on the back cover of the DVD)
Alfredo Bertone
,
Alfredo Martinelli
,
Charles Lane
,
Gail Kane
,
Gustavo Serena
,
J. Barney Sherry
,
Juliette La Violette
,
Lillian Gish
,
Roman Ibanez
,
Ronald Colman