The Brother from Another Planet

Dir: John Sayles, 1984. Starring: Joe Morton, John Sayles, David Strathairn. Black Cinema.

Who knew that you could use extraterrestrials to make a bold statement about racial conflict and immigration? Seems all too easy when you think about it, but John Sayles did it here with a surprising amount of brilliance.

It's been years since I've seen the film, and one of the joys of revisiting a classic movie is being able to finally understand its message through the humor and irony of the plot. In the movie we find an alien with African-American features (Joe Morton) who ironically crashes his spaceship at the Ellis Island Immigration Center. He hobbles around injured and observes the foreign surroundings before healing his wounds with a simple touch. Though he's unable to speak or make vocal sounds, he can understand every language on Earth and has other abilities that could be compared to that of a psychic superhero. The first that we observe is his ability to touch inanimate objects and hear the pain and anguish from spirits that used or were around the object. The only physical feature that sets him apart from others, besides the fact that he's black, are his three oversized toes as feet, which he keeps covered, of course.

Continue Reading
Posted by:
Edythe Smith
Jul 1, 2011 5:48pm
Shop Amoeba Merch Paypal Music & Movies Ship Free at Amoeba From Our Friends at Guayki We Buy Large Collections
x Sign-up for emails, sales alerts & more:


loading...

Register


New customers, create your Amoeba.com account here. Its quick and easy!


Register

Don't want to register? Feel free to make a purchase as a guest!

Checkout as Guest

Currently, we do not allow digital purchases without registration

Close

Register

Become a member of Amoeba.com. It's easy and quick!

All fields required.

An error has occured - see below:

Minimum: 8 characters, 1 uppercase, 1 special character

Already have an account? Log in.

Close

Forgot Password






To reset your password, enter your registration e-mail address.




Close

Forgot Username





Enter your registration e-mail address and we'll send you your username.




Close

Amoeba Newsletter Sign Up

Submit
Close