Jason’s Lyric

It has been called a black Romeo and Juliet, Doug McHenry's Jason's Lyric. A family drama which develops into a passionate love affair and ends in a bloodbath.

Jason Alexander has always believed in magic. When his father returns from Vietnam as a bitter war veteran, Jason hopes that the magic will make his loving father of old come back. But it is not to be. Jason is eleven years old when his father is shot dead.

Twelve years later Jason works as a salesman. One day the beautiful Lyric walks into the shop where he works. He falls in love and his faith in life returns. Jason's brother, Joshua, is a young offender who spends more time in than out of jail. He is in a gang who plans something big. The name of the leader is Alonzo, and he is Lyric's half-brother.

Partly this is a very gory story and the film has become controversial in the US. However McHenry claims that it was not the violence that gave Jason's Lyric trouble with the censors. If anything it was the sex scenes involving African-Americans that the Americans found hard to accept.