My Brother's Wedding

Charles Burnett's 1983 film follows a young Black man living in the Watts area of Los Angeles. Pierce works in his family's dry cleaners, has no direction, and reluctantly agrees to be best man at the wedding of his brother, who has become a lawyer. In the same days a childhood friend returns from prison. The tension at the centre is class. The distance between the brother's rise and the lives of those who stayed in the neighbourhood wedges Pierce into a place where he fully belongs to neither. Burnett builds this out of everyday scenes without lecturing. The film circulated on first release in an edit Burnett did not approve; his own version was completed only in 2007 and is now taken as standard. Burnett is among the most important figures of the Black independent film generation in Los Angeles. Who it's for: those interested in American independent film and in the history of Black cinema. Who it's not for: viewers wanting technical polish; the film was made on a very low budget and it shows in the sound and image.