The Brother from Another Planet

The 130th Spirit House

is dedicated to giving the neighborhood youth

an education in history

and a background in Islamic culture.

The Spirit House is funded

totally through private donations.

May Allah guide you, brother.

Police!

Police!

Police!

Put your hands up.

Up on top of the car.

Damn, Odell!

Man, this machine is fucked.

If it is, you fucked it.

- Zapped my spaceship right off the screen.

Wasn't nothing even close to it.

- Maybe it was internal malfunctions.

Internal malfunctions!

- A spaceship doesn't have to get hit to crash.

Some of them get internal malfunctions,

like when the astronauts cash in their tickets.

That's what usually did it.

Can I help you, brother?

- That's the seat McVeigh was sitting on

the night Percy Williams shot him.

Don't nobody like to sit on that seat.

Something the matter, brother?

There's a power in that seat.

Machine is fucked.

Internal malfunctions.

Damn!

Did it again.

They say it won't be long

before all those satellites

they sent up there years back

going to be crashing back down to earth.

Insides wear out up there.

Things go haywire.

No, man, they just get tired.

You know, start out with this orbit

that's real high and wide,

and the next time around,

you get a little closer to earth,

next time, a little closer,

and so on,

till gravity hook into it

and it come crashing down.

You hear some noise on your roof,

and you got a Sputnik sizzling in the living room.

- Get you something to drink, brother?

Maybe he don't drink.

Man don't drink.

What'd he come into a bar for?

- Man is a fugitive from a chain gang.

Got a hunted look on him.

The man's a wino

who should be out on the street.

- Damn, Odell getting hard-hearted

since he own this bar.

- Yeah, Odell, ain't nobody after the chair he's on.

Let the man sit.

Got bloodhounds at his heels.

- He's got internal malfunctions,

if you ask me.

Damn, Odell, look at it now.

Look what it's doing.

Looks like that thing they hook up to the dude's heart

for surgery on TV.

You broke it.

I didn't break nothing.

Damn machine up and quit on me.

- Sure you don't want nothing to drink, brother?

I want my quarter back.

- You know what's on them satellites

that come crashing down?

Diseases.

Diseases we ain't even got a name for.

Space germs.

- Can't nothing live out in space, not even germs.

No atmosphere.

Odell, give me my quarter back.

These ones can.

Man sat on the death seat,

and he felt it.

The seat's got a power to it.

Sit down, Smokey.

You'll get dizzy again.

This machine has had it.

Give me my quarter back, Odell.

Fly, I loaned you that quarter

in the first place.

Hey, brother,

do you speak English?

- You'll get everything eventually.

Every time I come in here,

I bring that whole damn folder.

Birth certificate, death certificate,

doctor's certificate, job certificate,

landlord certificate, tax form,

receipts, bills.

And every time I come in,

the one little piece of paper I ain't got

is the one they want.

Mrs. Brown, I think-

If I was 10 years younger,

I'd take another job

and be shed of the whole lot of you.

Mrs. Brown, look-

- Man tell me I got to be re-certified

because the regulations is changing.

Ain't nothing changing.

He just lost the damn form.

You look at that pile on his desk.

He can't find the telephone under that pile on his desk.

No way he going to find my ADC form.

Mrs. Brown, I think-

- Got egg salad all down his front

every time he talks to me,

and it ain't even lunchtime yet.

- Mrs. Brown, I'll take over your re-certification,

if you want me to.

Man wanted my folder,

but I wouldn't give it to him.

He done lost my whole life

under that pile on that desk.

Do he wash?

Mrs. Brown, look,

I'm out of here in half an hour.

If we're going to get this done, I need your help.

They never should have

let him pass the civil service test.

Man don't wash.

The man is deaf,

the man is crazy,

or the man is a wino.

- It takes one to know one, Smoke.

Odell?

Mm-hm?

- When did we have that new sign put up?

Let me see.

That was the day Mookie Wilson stole home.

Late August.

Yeah.

I can't find the bill.

- That's because your cousin put it up,

and he can't write.

Don't be smart.

What you want for dinner?

You mean what do I want,

or what do I want that you can cook?

Uh-oh!

Well, in that case,

where are you taking me for dinner?

What do you want to have?

You mean, what do I want,

or what do I want that you can afford?

Smokey?

What is he doing?

Diagnosis.

Diagnosis.

Pour me a drink, Odell.

Scotch.

Maybe it's rested up now.

Give me another quarter, Odell.

Here.

You're just going to bust it up some more.

How about Chinese food, Dell?

Think you can handle that?

- As long as the menu's in English.

I don't eat anything I can't pronounce.

Oh, this man.

- What are you doing with that drink, Smokey?

Diagnosis.

Crazy.

The man is definitely crazy.

How about Szechuan West?

- You know I don't go down there.

- Oh, come on, don't be that way.

Baby, you name me one thing,

one thing they got below 110th Street

that we ain't got up here,

you name it, and I'll stock it in the bar.

Hey.

Hey, Sam.

What it is, brother?

All right!

Yeah!

Touchdown.

My man.

Man's still got them soft hands.

Hey, Bernice, Smokey.

Hi, Sam.

Try not to break anything valuable.

You come just in time, Sam.

We got a client for you.

I'm off duty.

Uh-uh.

Check out the guy in the corner.

Who's his tailor?