''Cornbread, Earl and Me'' is a 1975 American
coming-of-age
Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can be ...
drama film
In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super- ...
that stars
Tierre Turner,
Laurence Fishburne
Laurence John Fishburne III (born July 30, 1961) is an American actor. He is a three time Emmy Award and Tony Award winning actor known for his roles on stage and screen. He has been hailed for his forceful, militant, and authoritative charact ...
(in his film debut), and
NBA player
Jamaal Wilkes. It was directed and co-produced by Joseph Manduke.
The film is loosely based on the 1966
Ronald Fair novel ''Hog Butcher''.
Plot
The film focuses on three
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...
youths living in an urban neighborhood. Nathaniel Hamilton is a star basketball player from the neighborhood, nicknamed "Cornbread." In the film, he epitomizes the dream of the neighborhood to be successful, as he is about to become the first from his district to enter college on an athletic scholarship.
He is also a local hero to the much younger friends Earl Carter and Wilford Robinson. The plot thickens after a pick-up basketball game ends because of a heavy rain, and all the kids run to the local store and hang out, waiting for the rain to end. All the kids leave, except for Cornbread, Earl and Wilford. Earl and Wilford get into a playful argument about how fast Cornbread can run home. It is decided that Cornbread should make it home in 25 seconds, so he runs off, after buying another soda for himself.
Unknown to all of them, an assault suspect in the neighborhood is dressed like Cornbread. The two police officers are hot on the suspect's trail, but lose him in the rain. As the police officers are coming out of an alleyway, they see Cornbread running and mistake him for the suspect they are seeking. Later the two officer fatally shoot Cornbread in the back.
Wilford screams hysterically, ensuing a riot. The coroner's inquest is hampered by severe police intimidation, and no one knows anything about the shooting, except for Wilford, who appears on the witness stand in court by telling exactly what he saw (in graphic detail).
Cast
*
Moses Gunn
Moses Gunn (October 2, 1929 – December 16, 1993) was an American actor of stage and screen. An Obie Award-winning stage player, he is an alumnus of the Negro Ensemble Company. His 1962 off-Broadway debut was in Jean Genet's ''The Blacks,'' and ...
as Benjamin Blackwell, lawyer
*
Rosalind Cash as Sarah Robinson, mother of Wilford
*
Bernie Casey
Bernard Terry Casey (June 8, 1939 – September 19, 2017) was an American actor, poet and professional American football player.
Early life
Casey was born in Wyco, West Virginia, the son of Flossie (Coleman) and Frank Leslie Casey. He graduated ...
as Officer Larry Atkins
*
Madge Sinclair as Leona Hamilton, mother of Cornbread
*
Laurence Fishburne III as Wilford Robinson
*
Thalmus Rasulala as Charlie, boyfriend of Sarah
*
Antonio Fargas
Antonio Juan Fargas (born August 14, 1946) is an American actor known for his roles in 1970s blaxploitation and comedy movies, as well as his portrayal as Huggy Bear in the 1970s TV series ''Starsky & Hutch''.
Early life
Fargas was born in New Y ...
as "One Eye"
*
Logan Ramsey
Logan Carlisle Ramsey Jr. (March 21, 1921 – June 26, 2000) was an American character actor of television and film for nearly 50 years.
Early life
Ramsey was born in Long Beach, California, the son of Harriet Lillian (née Kilmartin) and Capta ...
as Deputy Coroner
* Vince Martorano as Officer John Golich
*
Charles Lampkin as Fred Jenkins, store owner
*
Stefan Gierasch as Sergeant Danaher
*
Stack Pierce as Sam Hamilton, father of Cornbread
*
Tierre Turner as Earl Carter, Wilford's friend
*
Jamaal Wilkes (credited as Keith Wilkes) as Nathaniel "Cornbread" Hamilton
*
Hal Baylor
Hal Harvey Fieberling (born Hal David Britton); December 10, 1918 – January 15, 1998 known professionally as Hal Baylor, was an American actor, probably best known for his role as Pvt. 'Sky' Choynski in the film ''Sands of Iwo Jima''.
In 1 ...
as Mr. Wilson
*
Beverly Hope Atkinson as Edna
Release
Released on May 21, 1975, the film made $83,512 at New York City's Penthouse Theatre in its first week of release. In its third week of release the film made $228,000 from 12 cities. In 1977, the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...
'' stated that it was ultimately a box-office success.
[
In 2001, the film was released on DVD.]
See also
* List of American films of 1975
A list of American films released in 1975.
''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'' won the Academy Award for Best Picture. The highest-grossing film of 1975 was ''Jaws''.
__TOC__
A–B
C–G
H–M
N–S
T–Z
See also
* 1975 in the Un ...
* List of hood films
This is a list of hood films – films focusing on the culture and life of African-Americans, Hispanic Americans, and/or in some cases, Asian Americans living in segregated, low-income urban communities, as well as comparably deprived and crime-ri ...
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cornbread, Earl And Me
1975 drama films
1975 films
1970s coming-of-age drama films
African-American drama films
American International Pictures films
American basketball films
Blaxploitation films
Films based on American novels
1970s English-language films
1970s American films