A Raisin In The Sun [HD]

A deeply affecting movie
The <i>Hollywood Citizen-News</i> dubbed this "One of the most powerful films to grace the 1961 screen." I'd say that time has proven this to be one of the most powerful films to hit the screen in any year.

The character Walter Lee is a man driven to the edge of insanity by the prospect of seeing his dream slip right through his fingers. A dream that he thinks is his only way up. Sidney Poitier, who is <i>the</i> finest, most natural actor I have ever seen, plays this part flawlessly. Ruby Dee, Diane Sands, and Claudia McNeil also strike stunning, emotional performances as the family members dealing with not only Walter Lee's downward spiral, but also with their own issues and inner turmoil.

In keeping with its origins, the cinematography of the movie retains many aspects of a play, and is thus unlike modern movies that cater to the growing attention deficit of our society. However, the content and fine performances will capture your attention, regardless of what you...

"I am a giant, and I'm surrounded by ants."
With perhaps the best cast ever assembled for this play, David Susskind's 1961 production of Raisin in the Sun is a classic film and a landmark achievement during the civil rights struggles of the early 1960s. Starring a young Sidney Poitier as Walter Lee, Claudia McNeil as his mother Lena Younger, Ruby Dee as his wife Ruth, and Diana Sands as his sister Beneatha, the film closely follows the script of the play, and director Daniel Petrie wisely confines the setting almost entirely to one room, as it is on stage. This intensifies the emotions and interactions of this three-generation family, which share a small, two-bedroom apartment in South Chicago, and makes their longing to break free obvious both visually and emotionally.

Sidney Poitier as Walter Lee is the "giant...surrounded by ants" as he dreams of escaping his job as a chauffeur and investing in a liquor store. Poitier's body language and subtle gestures as he argues about how to spend his mother's ten thousand...

Subject matter still an issue today
The title of this film is taken from a line from a Langston Hughes poem called "A Dream Deferred":

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun
Or fester like a sore-

And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over-

Like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

"A Raisin In The Sun", an award-winning Broadway stage play brought to the screen, is a story about dreams. Everyone in this film has them, but the question is, do they ever come true? Do you have to put that dream on hold because of other circumstances beyond your control, until it consumes you to do something unthinkable? Or in order to reach that dream you want to come true so badly, you decide to take another route to get it? Or you just let it die, and you are forever regretting not taking the necessary steps to make that dreams a...

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