my Movie

Movie Details

Title:   Emma Mae
Director:   Jamaa Fanaka
Year:   1976
Genre:   Soul Cinema
Times Seen:   1
Last Seen:   07.02.08

Other Movies Seen By This Director (4)
- Penitentiary
- Penitentiary II
- Penitentiary III
- Welcome Home, Brother Charles

Notes History
Date Viewed Venue Note
07.02.08Weird Wednesday So when Fanaka was here last, I actually bought this along with his three other available DVDs. The cover and the title however (Black Sister's Revenge) kind of kept it on the shelf for me all this time. I think I was subconciously waiting for it to play Weird Wednesday again since I'd heard so many great things about it from when it played before. Lucky for me, it did!

For starters, the movie is absolutely nothing like what I thought it would be. I havn't see Killer of Sheep or any of Charles Burnett's work but I picture it being like this but more depressing. Very casual, tonally perfect, intimate and personal; a minor-key masterpiece along the lines of Marty and Claudine. Very slice-of-lifey, very charactery, and more than anything authentic. This is the work of a humanistic artist such as Cassavetes or Sydney Pollock, certainly not from the guy who just brought us midget prison bulls and strangling-penis Soul Vengeance, right? The tone of this movie was a bigger shock to me than anything in Pen 3, that's for sure.

I really loved this movie. It really has everything that a film like this needs and it's done with the perfect mix of competence and rough-edged inexperience. This is by far Fanaka's best film. It got a standing ovation.