While I'm waiting for my replacement copy of Hit Man (1972) with Bernie Casey, I thought I'd make a couple of mentions.
Last week, I went to the library in Baldwin Hills and though I will never try to do any work there again, they do have an interesting collection for the Black History buff looking for something else besides Malcolm and Martin. Another plus is avoiding the traffic that comes with going to the big library downtown.
Anyway, I ran across and borrowed That's Blaxploitation (really long subtitle intentionally not used), a creative works by Darius James a.k.a. Dr. Snakeskin that takes a lighthearted and sometimes funny look at Black films of the 70s and the actors who survived as well as those who fell off the radar.
While comprehensive and with its own special candor, the comical illustration and personal flashbacks may be the only minus I would give it, only because it gets excessive. And while I do have a few corrections, dude made some observations and really dug in the crates (Yep, there was really a movie called Honky as well as a 1976 movie(Pipe Dreams) with Gladys Knight and her real-life husband who is also the late singer Aaliyah's uncle/industry man Barry Hankerson -- and they're in Alaska of all places.)
*****
I forgot I wasn't real hard on Fred Williamson but am happy that he's one the few from that era who was actually smart about his money and took control of his characters' final destiny. Mean Johnny Barrows is somewhat entertaining; I think what got me was 'Uncut Director's Edition' in the AMZ listing. Decent story line but truthfully, I couldn't tell one villain after another or why he was so hard in love with the Beckster of the film since there wasn't even an attempt at chemistry. Didn't show him a tit or anything, hmmmf!
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