Plot Summary

Director Charles Burnett focuses on a black family originally from the deep South who have relocated to Los Angeles, and are starting to unravel from the cultural tensions between old and new ways. Into the household bursts Harry (charismatically played by Danny Glover), an unexpected visitor from back home, who exploits the family’s strains out of self-interest and pure devilment. Teaching their younger son to cheat at cards one moment, quoting Pushkin the next, Harry is both charmer and menace, like Joseph Cotten in Shadow of a Doubt. Burnett brings a uniquely gentle, relaxed, humane touch to this bitter comedy, made all the more convincing by its deceptively casual, transparent style of realism.