Warming By The Devil's Fire

Black director Charles Burnett returns to his roots in Mississippi in an autobiographical story of Junior, an 11 year old boy growing up surrounded by the sounds of blues and gospel.

Part of Martin Scorsese's seven-segment PBS series on the blues it is less of a documentary than a narrative story that refers to vintage Southern blues via the character of Junior's Uncle Buddy (Tommy Redmond Hicks), intercutting the episodic fictional story with archival footage of performers such as Lightnin' Hopkins, Willie Dixon, Son House, Big Bill Broonzy. To some extent the film falls between two stools, being neither straightforward documentary nor period film, thus frustrating viewers who will go to it with expectations of either, particularly, given its content, the former. This film is however closer to a pictorial essay on a moment in time and a place in history presented in the parallelized format of a personal memoir and a scrapbook of cuttings which sets it in motion. In this respect blues fans at least will find it of interest.

 

Want something different?