Down in the Delta

Loretta is a single mother in Chicago struggling with addiction. She cannot make the rent, cannot hold a job, cannot look after her two children. Her mother makes a last decision: she sends her, with the children, to Mississippi, to the land the family came from. She is to stay with her uncle for the summer. Loretta goes unwillingly and has no thought of staying. Maya Angelou directed the film; it was the only feature by Angelou, who is known as a writer. Alfre Woodard plays Loretta and Al Freeman Jr. the uncle, with Esther Rolle, Mary Alice, Loretta Devine and Wesley Snipes also in the cast. The telling does not make the recovery easy; the real subject is a family rebuilding its tie to its past, to its land and to each other.