The Delta
The Delta
•
1h 24m
Directed by Ira Sachs • 1996 • United States
Starring Shayne Gray, Thang Chan, Rachel Zan Huss
The complexities of race, class, and sexuality collide within a Memphis community in the strikingly raw debut feature from director Ira Sachs. With neorealist immediacy, THE DELTA tells what at first appears to be a simple love story: two young men—Lincoln (Shayne Gray), a closeted white teenager, and Minh (Thang Chan), a Black Vietnamese immigrant—meet at a cruising spot and embark on a nighttime journey by boat down the Mississippi River. But soon, imbalances of power and privilege emerge between them, as the film develops into a devastating vision of lost, wounded souls reaching out in the dark for human connection.
Up Next in The Delta
-
THE DELTA Commentary
This commentary track, recorded in 2001, features director Ira Sachs.
-
Ira Sachs and Keith Uhlich on THE DELTA
In this interview, produced in 2026, director Ira Sachs speaks with critic Keith Uhlich about his creative intentions for his first feature, THE DELTA, and about how his earlier shorts—VAUDEVILLE and LADY—shaped that film’s storytelling, mise-en-scène, and approach to character.
-
Vaudeville
Set within the world of amateur theater, this 1991 short by Ira Sachs follows a group of mostly gay and lesbian actors whose sense of unity begins to unravel as outside tensions seep into their collective life.
