Soaking It In: The Brother from Another Planet

The Brother from Another Planet (1984) by John Sayles: 108 minutes, 6.7 IMDB, 91.3% fresh tomatoes

My notes:

• 0:05:00 Steel drum music is brilliant.
• 0:36:15 Longing after the lost Harlem.
• 0:53:50 White guys from the Midwest. "That's what it's all about." "Give me five, brother."
• 0:55:30 "Where are you from." The child is the only one on Earth who understands The Brother's answer to that question.
• 0:57:29 The Brother frees the chained dog. That's a pretty poignant scene.
• 1:02:26 Wobbly camera; use of halo effect to indicate The Brother's intoxication.
• 1:03:15 The Rasta guy who guides the Brother through his intoxication is named Virgil; the name of Dante's guide through Inferno.
• 1:08:42 The men in black don't have The Brother's ability to understand other languages.
• 1:19:15 I wonder what The Brother wrote on that wall.
• 1:29:10 I ask the cousinnephew why The Brother is following the guy. He's not sure.
• 1:35:00 The men in the bar try their movie fight skills (in front of a Bruce Lee poster) and find that they don't work in this situation.
• 1:40:10 The Brother uses his camera/eye to make the man see "the big picture," which is as straightforward an artistic statement as you could ask for.
• 1:43:10 A whole group of Harriet Tubmans!
• 1:44:40 The men in black have to make their last stand in front of a "No Standing" sign.
• 1:45:30 The New York subway is the underground railroad, of course.

The cousinnephew summary:

• Feel like a lot of it didn't need to be played out that much. A lot of it seemed unnecessary.
• Him liking the singer. Being at the bar and fixing things. That was all just extra.
• I think a lot of the camera work. Like the end shot, they kinda needed a tripod.
• Some of the sound effects were kind of B-grade; a lot of that at the beginning.