A Lesson Before Dying (1999)

Hello! This is an American Masterpiece!

Hello! This is an American Masterpiece! Where are the critics? Where are the Oscars? This is Americana at its very best! At Amazon's current $6.99 it is a steal. Make sure you have some tissue's available. It's a heart warming tear-jerker of a movie.

Old aunt Emma, Jefferson, the feisty preacher, Irma P. Hall,
Mekhi Phifer, Cicely Tyson and the Grant Wiggins characters are never to be repeated performances.

This film has it all, from injustice in Court to Protestant and Catholic prejudices resolved with a polite conversation.

"A Lesson Before Dying" has made it to the top of the charts in my film world. Take a look. You won't be disappointed. September 23, 2007

"I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man."

From screenplay, to cinematography, and most certainly through the exceptional performances, this superb film is a tearjerker you can feel good about - on many levels.

The movie's most compelling quality is its clear-eyed view of racism in America's deep south. The black people we meet all have distinct personalities complete with problems, strengths, fears, disappointments, and ambitions - just like anybody else. They are people first, black people second. Racism, in all of its cruel and unjust stupidity, does not define them; it is simply the water they swim in, the air they breathe. This unbiased neutrality imbues A Lesson Before Dying with real force.

Every life is seen through the lens of racism. Jefferson (Mekhi Phifer) is the purest of victims, Grant (Don Cheadle) is the intellectual wrestling with fight or flight, Tante Lou (Cicely Tyson) is fierce in her belief that self-discipline holds the answer, while the unforgettable Miss Emma (Irma Hall) embodies all we've ever learned about the abiding courage and astounding endurance of black women, still strong enough to love, give, and do what it takes to defend their own.

This is a tough-minded picture that asks a very hard question. Everyone knows Jefferson is innocent, they also know he will be executed. But how can Grant help him die with dignity? Why is that such an important goal - a gift to himself, to Miss Emma, and to the children of the town? This quest touches everyone.

Don Cheadle is always worth watching, he was haunting in Hotel Rwanda. The good news is that his exceptional performance here is one of many that are woven together into a powerful, and very American story. Highly recommended. April 9, 2007

A lesson for us all

A "Lesson Before Dying" is a powerful and passionate film, so beautifully written and so beautifully acted it is one of those rare exceptions where the film adaptation is better than the book. Mehki Phifer gives a powerful performance as Jefferson, a young man sentenced to die for a crime he did not commit. He truly brings honesty and humanity to a young man who is seen by white society as inhuman. And Don Cheadle brings compassionate and dignity to the teacher who must help Jefferson stand tall.

I can't say enough about "A Lesson Before Dying." The injustice committed will anger you, the fate of Jefferson will sadden you, but ultimately knowing these people and sharing in their lives, and seeing dignity and love rise from the ashes of a cruel and uncaring world make the anger and sadness worth it all. April 7, 2006

There are more important lessons to be learned than death with dignity

In Louisiana in 1948 a young black man named Jefferson (Mekhi Phifer) makes the fatal mistake of accepting a ride from another pair of young men. When they stop at a local store to get some beer the other men do not have enough money and the white storeowner will not give them credit. Guns are drawn and everybody ends up dead but Jefferson, who is arrested for the crime. Since this is a question of black and white justice in the South before the Civil Rights Movement, Jefferson is condemned to be executed. The fact that he is innocent of the actual killings is not important to this 1999 HBO movie adapted from the novel by Ernest J. Gaines ("The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman"). Nobody is going to save Jefferson from his fate. The focus here is not on justice, but rather on death with dignity.

The key moment is not what happened in the store but rather what is said during the trial, when Jefferson's defense attorney, a white lawyer, seeks to save his client's life by saying that Jefferson is like a hog. That is to say, as a Negro Jefferson is no more intelligent than a hog and not capable of understanding what he is doing, therefore he should not be convicted. The jury, no doubt well acquainted with the practice of barbeque, has no more qualms about having Jefferson executed than they would of slaughtering a hog for a feast. But Jefferson's mother, Miss Emma (Irma P. Hall), and his aunt Tante Lou (Cicely Tyson), are outraged that the boy has been called a hog. So they badger local schoolteacher Grant Wiggins (Don Cheadle), the only educated black man in town, to visit Jefferson in jail and convince him that he is a man and not a hog.

Now, this is certainly an interesting idea. After all, the premise of white supremacy is that Negroes are not human, with the idea that they were property rather than people codified in the U.S. Constitution as well as implicit in the practice of slavery. If Jefferson accepts this characterization, advanced by his own attorney and inherent in the social system in which he lives, then convincing him otherwise is a noble effort. The flaw here is that I was not convinced that Jefferson thought he was a hog rather than a man. Maybe my problem is that Jefferson is played by an actor who is playing a doctor on "ER," not to mention the fact that I reject the idea of racial superiority or inferiority. But since his family accepts the fact that the white justice system is going to kill Jefferson I would be inclined to think he would be of a similar mind and that he would not take his lawyer's simile to heart. However, you really have to accept the premise or else the movie cannot have the requisite transformations at the end.

"A Lesson Before Dying" which won the 1999 Emmy for Outstanding Made for Television Movie, is one of those movies adapted from a novel where I have not read the book but I end up thinking the depth it provides probably fixes a lot of the film's shortcomings. Obviously I think the fault is to be found in Ann Peacock's Emmy winning screenplay, because the performances by the cast and as good as you would expect them to be, but if you buy the story's premise from the beginning then you will not be having a major problem with director Joseph Sargent's film. Given the Civil Rights Movement to come what becomes interesting is not so much the battle by Wiggins to communicate with Jefferson, but the conflict between the teacher and Reverend Ambrose (Brent Jennings) over what is best for the condemned young man. Does death with dignity preclude salvation or does the quest for salvation require acceptance of your fate?

Ultimately, the character who learns the most is Wiggins, as the teacher becomes the student. Wiggins is a college educated black man in a place where few of either color get such formal education. He resists being asked to do this task because it means going backwards, giving up some of his own dignity to go with hat in hand to ask the white men to be allowed to meet with Jefferson. The fact that Wiggins wants to marry a light-skinned Negro woman becomes part of this equation as well, because "A Lesson Before Dying" indicts the schoolteacher for turning his back on his race (indeed, there is a scene where his remarks to his students are as demeaning as those of any of the white characters). By the end of the film life with dignity is the goal. September 27, 2005

Hog of a story

During the first half of the 20'th century (and before) there were many injustices perpetrated against the negro. Those stories need to be told and understood. This movie tries to tell such a story but failed because it ignored the historical realities. I lived in a place much like the one in the movie in the 50's and was overwhelmed with the liberties the movie took with "the way it was."

First, had anybody white or black been caught with their hands in a cash register with 3 dead people around, they'd have been sentenced to die.

Second, the black people in those days were very poor. There were also poor whites. In the movie, these poor blacks wore cloths from Norstrom's! Not the way I remember it.

THird, there were some powerful white landowners that might have behaved as depicted in the movie. However, I often heard stories of charitable acts to the poor blacks. My father, who owned a grocery stroe, gave them food at Christmas. He forgave numerous blacks when he caught them red handed shop lifting. The cruelty and arrogance of the whites in the movie do not reconcile with my memories. Although I will readily admit such folks existed.

My grandparents had about 20 blacks that worked for them. My mother's nanny was black. I would characterize the relationship as one first of employer-employee, and second as one of affection. My grandmother, and I saw this many times, would be more of a supervisor not a bourbon drinking white ninny. I think my grandmother was more represntative of the way it was than the white woman in the movie. My mother and father tell stories of working right along with the blacks picking cotton.

Fourth, the blacks had a heavy and difficult to understand accent. Living in the west, I often am asked to repeat soemthing I said with my sourthern accent. Similarly, in the south, then negro at that time had a very strong accent...more of a dialect. The movie has them speaking the King's English with a fake accent.

Fifth, the dirt roads in those times were more like two tracks with pot holes, not well manicured packed gravel paths like you would see in a park today.

Again, I truely believe there have been many injustices against the negro. It is unfortunate that this movie could be more historically accurate so that those of us who lived in that era and that location could not be repulsed by the deviations from the truth and more moved by the fundamental stroy. November 15, 2004

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