Bush Mama
NR, 97 min.
Directed by Haile Gerima, Narrated by , Voices by , Starring Barbara O. Jones, Johnny Weathers, Susan Williams, Cora Lee Day.

Made by an Ethiopian-born filmmaker as his UCLA thesis project, Bush Mama is a rough, low-budget work of passion. It’s a story about life in the Watts ghetto that uses fantasy and forceful violence to make its points. Descibed in 1979 by Janet Maslin in The New York Times as “fiery, furious, overflowing with rhetoric, and lightly out of breath,” this film forms the bedrock to this entire body of work.

This article appears in March 10 • 2000.

A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.

SUPPORT US

Marjorie Baumgarten is a film critic and contributing writer at The Austin Chronicle, where she has worked in many capacities since the paper's founding in 1981. She served as the Chronicle's Film Reviews editor for 25 years.