Contemplative, timely film considers a changing SF
Opening on the heels of two recent, widely criticized national pieces bashing the “new” San Francisco in the New Yorker and the Washington Post, writer/director Joe Talbot’s first feature film, The Last Black Man in San Francisco, couldn’t be timelier. But Talbot has the advantage over those much dismissed east coast writers: he’s a San Francisco native (fifth generation, no less), and, as his film’s protagonist declares about our fair city by the Bay, “You don’t get to hate it unless you love it.”
Talbot’s film is both a love letter to, and a lament for, San Francisco, past and present. The film stars Jimmie Fails, Talbot’s longtime best friend and fellow San Francisco native, who plays a version of himself (also named Jimmie Fails), in a story loosely based on his real experiences growing up in SF. Fails and another first-time feature writer, Rob Richert, also wrote the script with Talbot, and the trio were rewarded for their efforts with a Special Jury Prize for Creative Collaboration at the Sundance Film Festival back in January. The film notably also garnered a Dramatic Directing Award for Talbot, as well as a Grand Jury Prize nomination – not too shabby for a group of filmmakers who had only done a short or two before their feature debut.
Jimmie’s story will be familiar to anyone with even a passing knowledge of dark San Francisco history. Jimmie’s grandfather, Jimmie tells us, came to SF from New Orleans after World War II, and built a beautiful Victorian in the Fillmore District with his own hands, as Jimmie proudly tells pretty everyone much he meets. The house was lost, though, as so many of that neighborhood’s African American owned homes were, as a result of misguided policy from San Francisco’s Redevelopment Agency back in the 1960s. The City’s black population never fully recovered from this displacement, and has been declining ever since.
Against this backdrop, Jimmie seeks to reclaim his family home when he finds that it has been abandoned because of an estate quarrel between its current owners, two well-to-do white sisters. With his friend Montgomery (Jonathan Majors) in tow, Jimmie essentially squats in the house, convinced his personal history makes his claim indisputable and binding. Of course, the home’s current legal owners and a greedy real estate agent (Finn Wittrock, deliciously smarmy) think otherwise.
How this dispute plays out makes up the narrative bones of the story, but Talbot, Fails, and Richert use the conflict as a catalyst to explore much more. Issues of art, family, community, gentrification, and, especially, truth — specifically the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of our lives — are at the picture’s forefront. How does a city maintain its diversity in the face of tremendous change, growth, and a deepening wealth divide? What happens to longtime residents forced out because of such changes? Montgomery lives with his grandfather (Danny Glover) near Hunter’s Point, and Jimmie sometimes crashes with them, sleeping on the floor in Montgomery’s tiny room. Jimmie’s Aunt Wanda (Tichina Arnold) has moved to the suburbs, Jimmie’s father (Rob Morgan) lives in an SRO in the Tenderloin, and Jimmie is estranged from his mother, who he is surprised to run into on Muni one afternoon, in a strange, awkward encounter that underscores the film’s theme of disconnection.
With friends and family so dispersed, what community is left for artists and others not at the top of the socioeconomic ladder? Montgomery’s neighbors and peers stand on the corner trash talking, while Montgomery, a quiet and watchful aspiring playwright, tries to make sense of the cycle of poverty and violence he sees his neighborhood.
At times the film does threaten to get bogged down with the weight of its issues, but Talbot, Fails, and Richert manage to keep the picture buoyant with the authenticity of the performances and the stunning cinematography; both the house in question and the City itself become characters. Cinematographer Adam Newport-Berra shows us lovely images of parts of SF we don’t typically see on screen: Bay View-Hunters Point, the Tenderloin, and the Fillmore all get their due (the house itself, which is supposed to be on Golden Gate near Fillmore, is actually on South Van Ness between 20th and 21st, and no doubt is bound to soon become an SF cinéaste tourist attraction). Jimmie’s primary method of transit is a skateboard, and we are treated to some terrific shots of Jimmie sailing down some of the City’s steepest streets, in images that are haunting and metaphorical, as they conjure feelings of joy, freedom, and belonging. A marvelous soundtrack, featuring local favorites like Jefferson Airplane and an exceptionally moving performance of “Are You Going to San Francisco” by Mike Marshall also help create film’s poignant mood.
By turns fantastical, elegiac, and melancholy, Talbot and company have created a rich portrait of indelible characters and a city in transition that will leave you both shattered and hopeful. Especially strong performances by Fails and particularly Majors make up for some of the film’s more heavy-handed elements (such as Montgomery’s performance of a one-man play that, while passionate and true, also feels like a slightly obvious method of hammering the filmmakers’ point home).
But, that said, artists like Montgomery add depth and character to a city, and, without them, we are left with a gaping, homogeneous void. As Aunt Wanda tells Jimmie, “If you leave, it’s not your loss – it’s San Francisco’s.” We’re lucky we have filmmakers like Talbot, Fails, and Richert to remind us of that, in stories like these, told with beauty and love.
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The Last Black Man in San Francisco opens today at Bay Area theaters.
