kdx112 This was a good film - well acted, good cinematography, overall decent production values. Loretta Devine (sp?) as usual did an excellent job with the material..her voice and presence are so distinct she stands out in any film that she does. The direction was also solid and I enjoyed it. The storyline with the bisexual father was also something different so points to the director for originality. However, I thought the sister of Loretta's character (she's also a well known actress) was a bit over the top...and I'm sure the director wanted that but he should have massaged her performance a bit. A good film indeed. This film was a good effort.

pjchatman This is an Black gay film. Not white. Not yellow. Not brown. Black. That said – Maurice Jamal, wrote acted (he plays Sherman's brother Eugene), directed, & produced this film, did a outstanding job of portraying a Black American family & their issues with homosexuality, which for Black Americans is more emotional than other races given the spiritual bond with church & home not seen in other races.This film is about Sherman-Patrick's (he goes by Patrick in New York & his family calls him Sherman) life being upset when he gets news he's a father. Upon arriving home he is confronted with his bullheaded mother, loving sister, resentful brother, & his very self-righteous Aunt. His problems gets worse when his boyfriend follows him to Paris, GA looking for answers (whether Gabriel is his son, & why Patrick lied about his Mother, and his name). This film has some very good drama & comedy, but you have to 'get it'. Since this is not a white-gay, Latin-gay, or Asian-gay film, they won't get it. But I did.The film starts off, yes, sloppy. We are indeed confused when see young Gabriel going to the airport, & then in the very next scene coming back home from the airport with Sherman. Jamal left the whole period of what happened when Gabriel was in New York until after Chapter 3 (the film's chapter, not the DVD). We, at first, are lead to believe that the family knows he's gay. This would certainty explain why he and his Mom argue when they meet after he brings Gabriel home. We even think he knows who Gabriel is for a minute or more. This makes the beginning feel very uneven, only because Jamal decides to tell us later what happened in New York rather than before – which again made the beginning uneven. But when Sherman/Patrick finds Ryan, his boyfriend, on the porch of his childhood home waiting for him (Ryan thought he was having an affair with another man named Sherman), the cat is let out the bag & the film falls into place, & continues from there. There are other silly scenes, but this is the particular character of the director (Cookie's 'crunch', the triple 'gasp', Aunt Lettuce's four sons) and just shows he has unique sense of direction.No film dealing with race and homosexuality is going to be 'perfect', but if it speaks to the intended audience than it accomplished it's goal. To Us (Blacks) we don't see Gay films as an excuse to get naked and swear. We explore the emotional-personal side of the lifestyle and not the sexual that most other races tend to focus on.To quote a white gay person: "'eye candy' seems like too strong a statement considering (again) no love scene, no shirtless scene, not even a muscle shirt... So by any reasonable measure, this is not really a 'Gay' movie." Ahem, Blacks live very different lives, and most are very spiritual. So the Gay experience for us is very different from those of other races. This was Black Gay film; therefore, no sex, no shirtless hunks, no shirtless hunks having sex – that's porn.

Ed Uyeshima I got the chance to see a rough cut of writer/director/actor Malcolm Jamal's film at the Castro Theatre during the 2006 San Francisco Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. As an openly gay black man, he lends a particularly unique and contemporary perspective on the Prodigal Son parable with this tale of a class-conscious New York-based magazine writer whose discovery of a ten-year old son leads him back to the family he left behind years ago in his hometown of Paris, Georgia. Those who have seen Cameron Crowe's "Elizabethtown" or Harvey Fierstein's "Torch Song Trilogy" will recognize the fish-out-of-water comedy that dominates the first half of the movie. However, the movie gradually congeals into a more resonant drama of acceptance and forgiveness without foregoing the humor.Despite his bare-bones production budget and a sometimes too facile approach to easy laughs, Jamal has a keen eye for his Deep South setting and especially his characters that manage to sidestep stereotypical treatment. What I particularly like about the family interactions is how Jamal chooses to emphasize the son's elitism that has alienated the family, not as much his sexual orientation. Rockmond Dunbar brings a sympathetic core to the uptight son, Patrick in his current life but Sheldon to his family. However, it's Loretta Devine who shines as his mother Evelyn, a hardened, alcoholic washerwoman who holds her own secrets and rails against her son with fervor. She seizes a great movie moment as she delivers a near-soliloquy at the dinner table near the end. With her foghorn, female-impersonator delivery, veteran scene-stealer Jenifer Lewis plays judgmental Aunt Lettuce with her usual gusto and provides the film's biggest laughs.Most of the cast is terrific - Terri J. Vaughn's supportive sister Jackie, Filipino comedian Alec Mapa as the overzealous metrosexual friend, Sommore's throaty turn as the sassy daughter-in-law, and Jamal's own performance as Sheldon's straight, dim-bulb brother who runs the local butcher shop. The one major fly in the ointment is Joey Costello who comes across far too flighty and naïve as Patrick's partner Ryan. The film has a too-pat though forgivable ending. In a concluding Q&A, Jamal said he just filmed the production in April and is touring this movie in select major cities in special showings through the summer. He hopes for a Christmas release at which point I say check it out. Jamal is a most idiosyncratic comedy talent.

R Gordon I caught a screening of this movie last year in Atlanta, GA. While the depiction of the Rockmond Dunbar's character was a bit trite, that facet didn't overwhelm the story. Loretta Devine was consistent, delivering a wonderful performance as the mother, and Sommore surprised the room with (1) her appearance at the screening and (2) her dramatic performance in this movie. This film is full of laughs, awkward moments, and, hopefully, a bit of enlightenment for men who continue to live separate lives...one when with their hometown family and another life hundreds of miles away in 'the life'.The main character's stereotypical high-voiced, dainty gay man character really bugged me. In reality, most gay men do not act like this--even when you find one, there are seldom two of them in a relationship (as shown in the movie). I'm not sure why the character was written this way, but, it's not my movie...I hope this film is well received. I will be seeing it again when it is released--not with my family, of course ;)