Blacksploitation

I'm not sure if I spelled that right, but I just watched a movie called 'Badassss Cinema.' It was a documentary on the "blacksploitation" movies in the 70s. I never really knew the background of movies like Shaft, Superfly, and Foxy Brown, but now I do. Hollywood was not making any money on their movies, and it was a very political time for black people in general (it always is). So a director decided to make a movie about black people for black people. It was called 'Sweet Sweetback's Sad Song' or something like that. It was pretty political/racy but it got a ton of black people to go to the theaters.

Once the producers and directors realized they had a market, everyone started producing these films where black people could fight back against the police, not die at the end, and become the hero. It was a great time, for a while.

Then the NAACP stepped in and decided that they didn't like these movies because they were too stereotypical (pimps, hos and drugs were prevalent) and that people shouldn't make them. That pretty much put the kibash (?) on those movies.

In this documentary, they interviewed Quentin Tarantino, Samuel L. Jackson, Pam Grier, Fred Williamson (hottie!), and Gloria Hendry. I now have several of these movies on my Netflix ('Coffy', 'Black Mama, White Mama', 'Superfly' and 'Black Caesar' )and I can't wait to see them. The one movie that seemed so cheesy was 'Blacula.' I didn't add that one.

One more thing about movies: I hate how anytime someone needs a girl for a part, they use Dakota Fanning. I wish they would use Olive from 'Little Miss Sunshine.' She is awesome. Great movie, by the way.