The story, set in Kansas during the 1920's, covers less than a year in the life of a black teenager, and documents the veritable deluge of events which force him into sudden manhood. The family relationships and enmities, the fears, frustrations and ambitions of the black teenager in small-town America are explored with a strong statement about human values.
The restraint, the composure, the sufficiency of the sentimental gesture constitute a small gift for memory and a real victory in the first stages of this filmmaker's career.
– Roger Greenspun,
New York Times,
9 May 2005
fresh:
The Learning Tree is a sentimental, sometimes awkward, but ultimately moving film about the growing-up of a black teenager in rural Kansas during the 1920s.