The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019)
90%RT Audience Score: 84%
Awards & Nominations: 18 wins & 59 nominations
An affecting story powerfully told, The Last Black Man in San Francisco immediately establishes director Joe Talbot as a filmmaker to watch.
The Last Black Man in San Francisco is a movie that will make you laugh, cry, and question the meaning of home. It’s a beautiful and heart-wrenching story about a man trying to hold onto his family’s legacy in a city that’s changing faster than he can keep up with. The cinematography is stunning, and the acting is top-notch. You’ll find yourself rooting for Jimmie Fails every step of the way, and the final shot will leave you breathless. This movie is a must-see for anyone who’s ever felt like they don’t belong.
Production Company(ies)
Charles Chaplin Productions,
Distributor
A24
Release Type
Theatrical, Theatrical (Limited)
Filming Location(s)
South Van Ness Avenue, The Mission, San Francisco, California, USA
MPAA / Certificate
Rated R for language, brief nudity and drug use
Year of Release
2019
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Color:Color
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Sound mix:Dolby Digital
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Aspect ratio:1.66 : 1
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Runtime:2h 1m
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Language(s):English
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Country of origin:United States
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Release date:Release Date (Theaters): Jun 7, 2019 Limited
Release Date (Streaming): Aug 13, 2019
Genre(s)
Drama
Keyword(s)
Worldwide gross: $4,637,830
Worldwide gross (inflation-adjusted): $5,358,802
Worldwide gross ranking (inflation-adjusted): 2,154
Worldwide tickets sold (est.): 584,384
US/Canada gross: $4,515,719
US/Canada gross (inflation-adjusted): $5,217,708
US/Canada gross ranking (inflation-adjusted): 1,794
US/Canada opening weekend: $235,272
US/Canada opening weekend (inflation-adjusted): $271,846
US/Canada opening weekend ranking (inflation-adjusted): 1,567
Budget and Earnings Details
Production budget (est.): NA
Production budget (inflation-adjusted): NA
Production budget ranking: NA
Marketing and distribution budget (inflation-adjusted est.): NA
Box office net earnings to date (inflation-adjusted est.): NA
ROI to date (est.): NA
ROI ranking: NA
Jimmie Fails – Jimmie Fails
Jonathan Majors – Montgomery Allen
Rob Morgan – James Sr.
Tichina Arnold – Wanda
Danny Glover – Grandpa
Mike Epps – Bobby
Director(s)
Joe Talbot
Writer(s)
Joe Talbot, Rob Richert
Producer(s)
Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Christina Oh, Joe Talbot
Film Festivals
Sundance
Awards & Nominations
18 wins & 59 nominations
Academy Awards
All Critics (208) | Top Critics (61) | Fresh (192) | Rotten (16)
It’s an independent film with a difference, but not as emotionally engaging as you’d really like it to be.
October 8, 2020 | Rating: 3/5
David Stratton
The Australian
TOP CRITIC
Fails and Talbot’s writing follows no script doctor’s convention. The direction reveals no obvious influences.
November 8, 2019 | Rating: 4/5
Donald Clarke
Irish Times
TOP CRITIC
It’s less of a rallying cry against gentrification than a rumination on the kind of pained acceptance those who suffer its effects must face.
October 30, 2019 | Rating: 4/5
Clarisse Loughrey
Independent (UK)
TOP CRITIC
It’s beautifully filmed and perfectly played. The final shot is as epic as it is heartbreaking.
October 28, 2019 | Rating: 4/5
Kevin Maher
Times (UK)
TOP CRITIC
The men behind The Last Black Man in San Francisco aren’t trying to be cool or sleek. That’s the last thing on their minds and probably explains why they do such a fine job of standing out from the crowd.
October 28, 2019 | Rating: 4/5
Charlotte O’Sullivan
London Evening Standard
TOP CRITIC
While Talbot and Fails avoid turning their homespun homesick story into an unwieldy and self-important metaphor for Black American Experience in total, creeping bloat makes itself felt elsewhere.
October 25, 2019
Nick Pinkerton
Sight & Sound
TOP CRITIC
A young man searches for a home in a city that has forgotten him. San Francisco hasn’t felt nor looked like this since Hitchcock. A vibrant city in a movie that blurs the line between reality and fiction. Impressive storytelling. [Full review in Spanish]
July 7, 2022 | Rating: 8/10
Victor Pineyro
Seventh Art Studio
Episode 42: Crawl / The Last Black Man in San Francisco / Chernobyl / Midsommar
October 4, 2021 | Rating: 95/100
Taylor Baker
Drink in the Movies
Wonders aloud if Thomas Wolfe was right when he wrote, “You can’t go home again.”
January 31, 2021 | Rating: 4/5
Richard Crouse
Richard Crouse
An odd exchange will be followed-up by something truly emotionally resonating, perhaps suggesting that whatever eccentricities are applied are only to make each profound moment that much more so.
October 2, 2020
Peter Gray
This is Film
Gentrification is poetically rendered in this thought-provoking indie starring Jimmie Fails as a man holding onto the home his grandfather built in a changing city.
September 3, 2020 | Rating: 3/4
Jason Fraley
WTOP (Washington, D.C.)
As one of the best films of the festival, The Last Black Man in San Francisco reminds you why cinema was invented. With sincere, heartfelt moments that run the spectrum, Talbot’s direction is a stellar debut that leaves you breathless.
September 3, 2020 | Rating: 4.5/5
Kelechi Ehenulo
Confessions From A Geek Mind…
Plot
Jimmie Fails IV, a black man, is a third generation San Franciscan. Having been pushed out by circumstances like many others, Jimmie, who works a low paying job as a nurse in a seniors’ care facility, returned to San Francisco three years ago and has been living in his best friend Montgomery Allen’s house that he shares with his blind grandfather, Jimmie who sleeps on the floor in Mont’s already cramped bedroom. Despite the house, Mont’s situation is not much better than Jimmie’s, Mont who works at a supermarket fish counter while he sketches and writes a play on the side. Other black people around him who are showing their anger in also being disenfranchised from San Francisco life are the soapbox preacher who Jimmie and Mont often watch as they wait for the bus, and a group of young black men who hang outside of Mont’s house. All of Jimmie’s family, who he rarely sees, are also disenfranchised from that San Francisco life in one way or another: his estranged father lives in an SRO; his mother and her new husband long moved to Los Angeles; and his paternal Auntie Wanda has been pushed out to the suburbs. Jimmie has long wanted to reclaim what he sees as his place in San Francisco, which to him means the house he grew up in and which his same named paternal grandfather built in the post-war era in a style indicative to the area a century earlier. The problems are that his father lost the house long ago, the neighborhood has since been gentrified from the immigrant neighborhood it once was, increasing the value of the house to the several millions, and a white couple currently lives there, there being no indication that they are either planning on leaving or selling even if Jimmie could afford it. Regardless, Jimmie, with Mont by his side, has and continues to take steps to reclaim the house as his to his standards.
Trivia
Goofs / Tidbits
NA
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