Presented as part of our Charles Burnett Retrospective. Burnett will be honored in person with our Cinema Savant award on Saturday, November 2 at 7pm. Event information can be found here.

"Representative of a strain of American independent cinema conceived and produced in opposition to (and largely in spite of) the surrounding pop-culture climate." - the Ringer

"Burnett's acute and sensitive direction is free of hackneyed movie conventions; even something as simple as a hello is said differently from the way you've heard it in any other movie." - Chicago Reader

Charles Burnett's second feature is an eye-opening revelation - wise, funny, heartbreaking and timeless. Pierce Mundy works at his parents' South Central dry cleaners with no prospects for the future and his childhood buddies in prison or dead. With his best friend just getting out of jail and his brother busy planning a wedding to a snooty upper-middle-class black woman, Pierce navigates his conflicting obligations while trying to figure out what he really wants in life.

Presented with Burnett's short film The Horse (1973, 14 minutes). A haunting coming-of-age tale about an African American boy tending to a horse that is to be put down.