# To Sleep with Anger
**To Sleep with Anger** is a 1990 American drama film written and directed by Charles Burnett, starring [Danny Glover](https://www.edgepedia.org/danny-glover) as Harry Mention, an enigmatic drifter from the South who arrives unannounced at the Los Angeles home of an old friend and disrupts a middle-class African American family.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) Made on a modest budget of $1.4 million, it won major independent film awards, was added to the [National Film Registry](https://www.edgepedia.org/national-film-registry) in 2017, and is widely regarded as one of the key works of 1990s American independent cinema despite a poorly handled theatrical release.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) • [2](https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/film/to-sleep-with-anger/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director and writer | Charles Burnett, his third feature, after *Killer of Sheep* (1977) and *My Brother's Wedding* (1983)[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) |
| Lead cast | Danny Glover (Harry Mention), Paul Butler (Gideon), Mary Alice (Suzie), Carl Lumbly (Junior), Richard Brooks (Babe Brother), Sheryl Lee Ralph (Linda)[3](https://www.pressman.com/to-sleep-with-anger) |
| Budget and gross | $1.4 million budget; about $1.2 million grossed in a release limited to roughly 18 theaters[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) • [4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) |
| Release | Premiered in Atlanta on October 12, 1990, seven days after its New York Film Festival screening; distributed by the Samuel Goldwyn Company[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) • [3](https://www.pressman.com/to-sleep-with-anger) |
| Major awards | Special Jury Award, Sundance 1990; four Independent Spirit Awards in 1991; National Society of Film Critics Best Screenplay[3](https://www.pressman.com/to-sleep-with-anger) |
| Runtime and rating | 102 minutes, rated PG[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/to_sleep_with_anger) |
| Preservation | Added to the Library of Congress National Film Registry in 2017[2](https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/film/to-sleep-with-anger/) |
| Critical standing | 93% on the Tomatometer from 104 reviews[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/to_sleep_with_anger) |
## Spoilers
### Plot and characters
Gideon (Paul Butler) and Suzie ([Mary Alice](https://www.edgepedia.org/mary-alice)) are southern transplants raising a family in South Central Los Angeles. Their two married sons, the dependable Junior ([Carl Lumbly](https://www.edgepedia.org/carl-lumbly)) and the rudderless Babe Brother ([Richard Brooks](https://www.edgepedia.org/richard-brooks)), already carry simmering animosity toward each other. Harry Mention (Danny Glover), a charismatic storyteller and old friend from their days in the South, arrives on their doorstep and is gladly received, but he overstays his welcome, and his insidious ways and sinister energy catalyze a rupture of the extended family's fabric.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart)
Harry's macho influence takes particular hold of Babe Brother, sharpening the conflict with Junior and turning Babe Brother against his wife Linda ([Sheryl Lee Ralph](https://www.edgepedia.org/sheryl-lee-ralph)). Gideon falls gravely ill, and Harry gradually fills the house with hard-gambling, liquor-drinking old chums from the South who never seem to leave.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) • [6](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/big%20screen%20classics/2022/07/06/to-sleep-with-anger/) The film's ending hinges on the youngest character: Babe Brother and Linda's son Sunny, who early in the film carelessly spills his marbles, does so again after a family confrontation, and Harry trips over them, falls, and suffers a fatal cardiac arrest.[6](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/big%20screen%20classics/2022/07/06/to-sleep-with-anger/)
## Folklore and the trickster figure
Burnett cited a character from African American folklore, the Hairy Man, as the inspiration for Harry. The Hairy Man is a shape-shifter who cannot be gotten rid of unless he is outsmarted, traits present in Harry in a less fantastical form.[7](https://cinema.ucla.edu/blog/myth-memory-and-history-in-to-sleep-with-anger/) The name Harry evokes the 'Hairy Man' of folktale, a tricksterish amalgam of African spirit, Native American 'wild man', and European demon.[8](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger) Burnett said the film draws on the myth of [Harry Man](https://www.edgepedia.org/harry-man), a trickster who can steal souls, and fills its contemporary Los Angeles setting with folkloric references: John Henry, "swamp root", the mystical "crossroads", blues songs and spirituals, good-luck charms, dark omens, midwifery, and moonshine.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1990/10/28/out-of-obscurity/1b851f9f-5e59-48b1-b22e-dc78bb628298/)
Supernatural suggestion without spectacle is a deliberate method. Critics have noted that although the film is loaded with supernatural rituals and black magic, Burnett never shows special effects or B-movie visions of evil; the surface stays naturalistic, in the way Buñuel's dream sequences do.[10](https://mubi.com/en/films/to-sleep-with-anger/critics-reviews) The film's themes set Christianity and mysticism, tradition and modernity, and rural southern folkways against urban middle-class respectability.[6](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/big%20screen%20classics/2022/07/06/to-sleep-with-anger/) • [11](https://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/reviews/view/6301/to-sleep-with-anger)
## Production
The project began as a protest against editorial interference. In the mid-1980s the Public Broadcasting Service offered Burnett funding for a script based on a true story from his community, but insisted he alter the facts to heighten the drama. Unwilling to distort a real tragedy, he proposed an original fictional story instead, which became *To Sleep with Anger*.[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) • [12](https://www.bkmag.com/2016/09/09/charles-burnett-to-sleep-with-anger/)
Danny Glover, then a genuine Hollywood attraction on the heels of the first two *Lethal Weapon* films, attached himself as star and executive producer, and his box office clout was instrumental in securing the $1.4 million budget.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) • [8](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger) It was Burnett's first film made with a professional cast.[8](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger) The film was shot entirely on location in a 28-day schedule, with three additional days for pickups, from mid-June through the end of July 1989; the family home was a house in the West Adams area of [South Los Angeles](https://www.edgepedia.org/south-los-angeles) dating to the first decade of the twentieth century.[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) Financing took years and the production ultimately accumulated twelve producers.[13](https://www.filmcomment.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2010s2015VOLUME-51-NUMBER-06-NOVEMBER-DECEMBER-2015.pdf)
## Release and reception
The film premiered in Atlanta on October 12, 1990, seven days after screening at the [New York Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/new-york-film-festival), and went on to play in only 17 more theaters, grossing about $1.2 million, less than its budget.[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) The Samuel Goldwyn Company marketed it as an art-house curiosity rather than a film with wider appeal, particularly for black audiences, and booked it in theaters not usually frequented by black moviegoers; a release in Washington, DC, where fellow LA Rebellion filmmaker Haile Gerima helped bring out the African American audience, was successful.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) • [4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) The film's fate paralleled that of other unorthodox works by independent black filmmakers of the period, such as Julie Dash's *Daughters of the Dust*, Wendell B. Harris Jr.'s *Chameleon Street*, and Charles Lane's *Sidewalk Stories*: high critical praise and box-office oblivion.[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart)
Awards recognition was substantial. At the 1990 [Sundance Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/sundance-film-festival) it won a Special Jury Recognition, Dramatic, and was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize. At the 1991 [Independent Spirit Awards](https://www.edgepedia.org/independent-spirit-awards) it won Best Director and Best Screenplay for Burnett, Best Male Lead for Glover, and Best Supporting Female for Sheryl Lee Ralph, with nominations for Best Feature, Best Female Lead (Mary Alice), and Best Supporting Female (Ethel Ayler). The National Society of Film Critics named it Best Screenplay of the year.[3](https://www.pressman.com/to-sleep-with-anger) Critics at the time were strongly positive; the [Chicago Tribune](https://www.edgepedia.org/chicago-tribune)'s Dave Kehr called it "the first great film to come our way in quite a while".[1](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart) Roger Ebert, reviewing in October 1990, called it a subtle kind of horror movie in which the unwelcome visitor is a soft-spoken, well-dressed relative from down South, while judging that the film played too slowly.[14](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/to-sleep-with-anger-1990) On Rotten Tomatoes it holds 93% from 104 critics and 79% from audiences.[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/to_sleep_with_anger)
## Legacy
The film was added to the National Film Registry in 2017, joining Burnett's *Killer of Sheep*, which was among the registry's inaugural 50 selections in 1990.[2](https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/film/to-sleep-with-anger/) • [15](https://www.tcm.com/articles/020943/charles-burnett-reflects-on-to-sleep-with-anger) A fully restored version screened at the 72nd [Venice Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/venice-film-festival) in 2015 as part of its restored classics selection, the most recently made of the dramatic features chosen that year.[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) [Home video](https://www.edgepedia.org/home-video) scarcity long kept the film hard to see; it had no US DVD release for decades, with only UK DVDs from the [British Film Institute](https://www.edgepedia.org/british-film-institute) available, before a 4K restoration brought it to disc.[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) • [2](https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/film/to-sleep-with-anger/)
The film is also read as a counterpoint to the violent stories of urban strife that dominated early 1990s African American cinema, locating its tensions in the middle-class domestic sphere, and as a variant on the 'home invasion' thriller with echoes of European art films about disruptive outsiders such as Pier Paolo Pasolini's *Theorem* (1968).[8](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger) Burnett, born in Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1944 and raised in Watts, drew on his own southern-rooted Los Angeles upbringing; he has described his California childhood as culturally "so Southern".[4](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/) • [8](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger)
## References
1. [To Sleep with Anger: You Never Know What's in the Heart, Ashley Clark, Criterion Collection](https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6216-to-sleep-with-anger-you-never-know-what-s-in-the-heart)
2. [To Sleep with Anger review, Sean Axmaker, Video Librarian](https://videolibrarian.com/reviews/film/to-sleep-with-anger/)
3. [To Sleep With Anger, Pressman Film](https://www.pressman.com/to-sleep-with-anger)
4. [The Awakening of 'Anger' 25 Years Later, Edward Landler, CineMontage](https://cinemontage.org/awakening-anger-25-years-later/)
5. [To Sleep With Anger, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/to_sleep_with_anger)
6. [To Sleep with Anger, BFI Southbank Programme Notes](https://bfidatadigipres.github.io/big%20screen%20classics/2022/07/06/to-sleep-with-anger/)
7. [Myth, Memory and History in To Sleep with Anger, UCLA Film & Television Archive](https://cinema.ucla.edu/blog/myth-memory-and-history-in-to-sleep-with-anger/)
8. [Finest hours: Danny Glover as the malevolent charmer in To Sleep with Anger, BFI](https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/finest-hours-danny-glover-malevolent-charmer-sleep-with-anger)
9. [Out of Obscurity, David Mills, The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1990/10/28/out-of-obscurity/1b851f9f-5e59-48b1-b22e-dc78bb628298/)
10. [To Sleep with Anger critic reviews, MUBI](https://mubi.com/en/films/to-sleep-with-anger/critics-reviews)
11. [To Sleep with Anger film review, Spirituality & Practice](https://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/films/reviews/view/6301/to-sleep-with-anger)
12. [Lives That Matter: Talking to Charles Burnett About To Sleep with Anger, BKMAG](https://www.bkmag.com/2016/09/09/charles-burnett-to-sleep-with-anger/)
13. [Film Comment, Vol. 51 No. 6, November-December 2015](https://www.filmcomment.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2010s2015VOLUME-51-NUMBER-06-NOVEMBER-DECEMBER-2015.pdf)
14. [To Sleep With Anger movie review, Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/to-sleep-with-anger-1990)
15. [Charles Burnett Reflects on To Sleep with Anger, Donald Liebenson, TCM](https://www.tcm.com/articles/020943/charles-burnett-reflects-on-to-sleep-with-anger)
---
*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1990s › Drama films early 1990s*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license