Yamekraw (1930) is a weird, cardboard jazz fever dream

If you have thirteen minutes and you like jazz, you should probably watch this. It is weird and short and feels like something you'd find on a dusty VHS tape in a basement.

People who like old experimental stuff or Harlem Renaissance history will dig it. If you need a plot with talking and logic, you're going to hate it. 🎷

The whole thing is wordless. It’s based on a "Negro Rhapsody" by James P. Johnson, and the music is doing about 90% of the work here.

It starts in this rural setting that looks like a high school play. But in a cool way. The trees look like they are made of cardboard and the lighting is super dramatic.

Jimmy Mordecai plays the main guy. He has these huge, expressive eyes that do more than ten pages of dialogue could ever do.

He leaves his wife at the cabin to go to the "big city." The city isn't a real place though. It's just a bunch of tilted signs and shadows that look like a German Expressionist movie like Die ewige Nacht but with more rhythm.

The Club Scene

Once he gets to the city, he ends up in this dive bar. The dancing here is actually pretty wild for 1930.

Louise Cook shows up as the dancing girl. She moves like her joints are made of rubber bands. It’s kind of hypnotic and also a little bit frantic.

• The way the crowd moves in sync feels like a dream.
• There is one shot of a trumpet player that is just... perfect.
• Everything feels cramped and sweaty.

Then the guy gets "two-timed." He sees the girl with someone else and his face just falls. It’s a very simple story, almost like a fable or a long music video before those were a thing.

I noticed one guy in the background of the club who looks like he’s just waiting for his paycheck. He’s barely moving while everyone else is losing their minds. It’s funny how some things in movies never change. 😂

The sets are the best part. They are semi-surreal. They don't try to look real at all. It makes the whole movie feel like it's happening inside someone's head while they listen to the radio.

It reminds me a little bit of the theatricality in Uncle Tom's Uncle, but way more serious and artistic. Or maybe even the stylization in Filibus, though that's a totally different vibe.

The Return Home

After he gets his heart broken, he just... walks back. The transition from the city back to the country is fast. The music gets slower and more mournful.

His wife is just waiting there. She takes him back immediately. It’s a bit of a simple ending, maybe too simple, but the movie is so short it doesn't really matter.

The film grain is heavy in some versions of this. It adds to the mood. You can almost smell the old film stock and the cigarette smoke from the 1930s theater.

I think the director, Murray Roth, was trying to see if you could tell a whole story just through movement and sound. For the most part, it works. Even if the "rural" parts feel a bit like a postcard.

Is it a masterpiece? I don't know. It’s more like a really interesting sketch. A mood piece that doesn't overstay its welcome.

There's a moment where the shadows on the wall are bigger than the actors. It's clearly intentional. It makes the man look small and the city look like a monster.

I've seen some other shorts from this era like Speeding Through, and they usually try to be funny. This one tries to be art. It's a nice change of pace.

If you're bored of modern movies that explain every single emotion, watch this. It won't tell you how to feel, the trumpet will just do it for you.

The ending shot of the cabin is a bit blurry. Or maybe that's just the copy I watched. It feels like a memory fading out. 🎺