Killer of Sheep Returns

Burnett's 'Killer of Sheep'
by Esther Iverem--SeeingBlack.com
Editor and FIlm Critic

For its 30th anniversary, Charles Burnett’s acclaimed masterpiece, “Killer of Sheep,” an unsentimental and quirky portrait of the Los Angeles Black working-class, has been restored and upgraded to a 35-mm print for the proper theatrical release that it never had in 1977. As it makes its way to dozens of cities in the coming weeks, film lovers may recognize it as an important missing link between the Blaxploitation era of movies of the 1970s and the “New Wave” of Black filmmakers that began with Spike Lee’s debut in 1986.

Shot entirely in black-and-white 16mm while Burnett was a graduate student at UCLA, “Killer of Sheep” has been lauded for its authentic depiction of African-American life,(obviously in comparison to that era’s cinematic thug life). Bittersweet and moody, the 83-minute movie revolves around the family of a man named Stan (Henry Gayle Sanders), who we learn works in a slaughterhouse; his unnamed wife (Kaycee Moore), who seems to spend all her time trying to primp for Stan; and their two unnamed children — a boy and younger girl — who have a life “in the street” all of their own.

It is actually through the children that Burnett explores the environment of humble bungalows with porches alive with young chatter and energy, and fences with gaping holes just the right size for a boy to crawl through. Two of the funniest scenes involve Stan’s young daughter: In one, she wears a dog mask, and, in the other, she butchers the lyrics to Earth Wind and Fire’s “Reasons” while playing with a naked White doll. Child’s play also becomes Burnett’s unlikely vehicle to comment on the easy dangers of everyday life. Homemade scooters fly into the street, just barely missed by an approaching truck. Children throw rocks at one another. A train yard and train tracks become dicey places of amusement.

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This review first appeared on www.BET.com. Please support SeeingBlack.com by ordering Esther Iverem's We Gotta Have It: Twenty Years of Seeing Black at the Movies, 1986-2006 (Thunder’s Mouth Press, April 2007)at Amazon.com or at your favorite bookstore. Thanks!