A Lesson Before Dying
A young man's destiny becomes a teacher's journey.
In the 1940s South, an African-American man is wrongly accused of the killing a a white store owner. In his defense, his white attorney equates him with a lowly hog, to indicate that he didn't have the sense to know what he was doing. Nevertheless convicted, he is sentenced to die, but his godmother and the aunt of the local schoolteacher convince school teacher go to the convicted man's cell each day to try to reaffirm to him that he is not an animal but a man with dignity.
- Year: 1999
- Country: United States of America
- Genre: Drama
- Studio: Spanky Pictures, Ellen M. Krass Productions, HBO Films
- Keyword: politics, aunt, 1940s
- Director: Joseph Sargent
- Cast: Don Cheadle, Cicely Tyson, Mekhi Phifer, Irma P. Hall, Brent Jennings, Lisa Arrindell