Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.5

The Last Black Man in San Francisco Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman April 9, 2021

Childhood homes seem to hold a special place in many people’s memories. One of the best holiday presents I ever received was decades ago on Christmas Eve day when I was visiting Salt Lake City, where I had grown up, and I dropped by the house I was born in but had moved out of when I was probably eight or nine or so. I was taking pictures of it when the current owner appeared at the front door, and I apologized profusely, but it turned out he had been the one to buy the house from my parents, and he invited me in to look around. I’m not ashamed to admit I was overcome with emotion as a whole slew of memories flooded my mind, but the overarching experience was one of both familiarity and surprise, since the house, to my adult mind, was considerably smaller than I had remembered. Childhood homes are at the center of the frequently touching The Last Black Man in San Francisco, a film which offers Jimmie Fails in a somewhat fictionalized version of his own story, wherein the encroaching gentrification of the film’s titular city has left several of its longtime residents by the wayside. What’s interesting as a kind of foundational if subliminal aspect is how The Last Black Man in San Francisco conflates family legacies with structures, since an underlying plot conceit is that Jimmie continues to visit and fix up a charming Victorian which he insists his grandfather built in the post World War II era, but which is now owned by an older white couple. In fact, the film’s whole opening sequence is kind of almost surreal, as Jimmie and his best bud Montgomery Allen (Jonathan Majors) hang out waiting for a bus while a “street preacher” rants nearby at hazmat wearing workers who are picking up trash. The “sermon” already hints at a city experiencing both growth and dissolution, but the focus soon turns to Jimmie and Mont, who forsake waiting for the bus to both ride Jimmie’s skateboard to their destination. That turns out to be Jimmie’s childhood home, though that isn’t initially disclosed. Instead the two kind of sneak around the property, making sure no one is there, before Jimmie rather unexpectedly climbs a ladder and begins painting a window sash. Only when the current owners show up and begin pelting Jimmie with the groceries they’ve just purchased does Jimmie’s obsession with something he thinks of as his (or at least rightfully his) become more apparent.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco has a lot on its mind, but at its core this is a character study built around both friendship and the vagaries of memory and, perhaps, "family stories". It will probably be patently obvious to anyone with even a passing interest in architecture and/or history that the gingerbread Victorian that Jimmie thinks his grandfather built circa 1946 most likely was constructed in the 19th century, but in a way, that "fact" hardly matters. Jimmie is searching for an anchor of sorts in a life that has seen repeated hardships, and the house serves that function perfectly well. When the white couple who live there move out, and a (white) realtor named Clayton Newsom* (Finn Wittrock) discloses that a battle over an estate means that it may remain unoccupied for some time, Jimmie and Mont, along with a coterie of hangers on, simply decide to move in. Jimmie furnishes the house with items provided by his Aunt, which were supposedly once in the house back in the day. Obviously, Jimmie is trying to recreate something stable he at least thinks he experienced in childhood.

And in fact, it's maybe arguable that The Last Black Man in San Francisco has too much on its mind, in terms of both some of its wending narratives (which include subplots about a kind of quasi-street gang, as well as interfamily dynamics between Jimmie and Mont and their respective fathers), and in terms of its presentational quirks, which almost verge on magical realism at times. The sometimes odd moments are exemplified by the hazmat suit wearing workers or even a brief vignette where Mont, an artist who is frequently seen adding to his portfolio in a sketch book, is suddenly set upon in a row boat by a deformed fish (in another allusion to the degradation of San Francisco's environment, which is evidenced by those very hazmat suit wearing workers). All of this gives The Last Black Man in San Francisco a decidedly whimsical ambience a lot of the time, but that may in fact undercut some of the emotions at play.

Still, The Last Black Man in San Francisco does have its undeniably moving moments, as well as some comedic interstitials. But a lot of what the film posits as a "given", as in the initial shared living arrangement between Jimmie and Mont, might have used a bit more contextualizing or development. The film offers great showcases for both Fails and Majors, and Danny Glover and Rob Morgan also make strong impressions as the fathers of Mont and Jimmie, respectively. Joe Talbot's stylistic proclivities are also remarkable, and it's easy to understand why he won the Best Director award at Sundance for this film.

*The choice of this surname probably inevitably calls to mind San Francisco's former mayor and the current governor of California.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Last Black Man in San Francisco is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. The closing credits offer a generic Arri logo, but the IMDb lists Alexa Minis as having been used, with a 2K DI. The visual side of things if frequently highly stylized, and though the film uses bounteous location shots, at times it seems like greenscreen might have been used for backgrounds for moments like the street preacher, giving things a slightly unreal quality. The palette is beautifully suffused, and can often veer toward warmer territory like golds and reds. Detail levels are frequently quite impressive, offering excellent accounts of finely patterned costumes or some of the textures on, in and around the house that Jimmie takes over.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Last Black Man in San Francisco features an enjoyable DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that establishes nice surround activity in the frequent outdoor moments, as well as in the use of both source cues and underscore. Even some of the quieter interior scenes offer clear placement of ambient environmental sounds in discrete channels, and dialogue is always rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English and Spanish subtitles are available.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary with Writer / Producer / Director Joe Talbot


• Ode to the City: Finding The Last Black Man in San Francisco (HD; 11:02) is an appealing making of featurette, with good interviews with Talbot and Jimmie Fails.

Trailers for other releases from Lionsgate round out the on disc features, and a digital copy code is also included.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There is a lot to like, maybe even love, about The Last Black Man in San Francisco, and the film has its own inimitable style, which some viewers may understandably feel doesn't always completely support its more heartfelt aspects. For anyone who has indelible memories of their own childhood home, or who has perhaps seen their hometowns give way to both disrepair and gentrification, this story will offer some considerable interest. The performances are all worthwhile, and Joe Talbot offers a really interesting visual approach. Technical merits are solid, and The Last Black Man in San Francisco comes Recommended.