1971 movie rated X by an all-white jury
Rating: 15/20
Plot: A black man is on the run from the law after defending another black man beaten by police.
You could argue that this isn't technically competent, and it's not very well acted. And no, I'm not saying anything against "the black community" which stars in this or Brer Soul. And, you know, the narrative is really weak. I mean, I'm pretty lazy with plot synopses sometimes, but my one-sentence plot summary up there is probably about twice as long as it needs to be. But you don't watch a movie like this 40-some years after its release and compare it to other movies or ignore its original context. And you don't really watch a movie like this because you want to see good storytelling or good acting. You watch a movie like this with your corduroy bell bottoms and double-breasted peacoats and try to imagine what it would feel like watching this in 1971. It's tough to imagine that context now because racism has virtually disappeared from America.
Regarded--legitimately or not could be argued--as the first blaxploitation movie, this just might be the most revolutionary one as well. Everything is so blatant here, all in your face whether you want it there or not. I mean, the movie starts with a sex scene between a little kid (Peebles' son) and a middle-aged woman. It reminds me of how I lost my virginity actually. Well, the gospel music in the background did anyway. The sex scenes are very tame for a movie originally rated X. The "all-white jury" must have also been all prude. There's a wild sex show before our inciting incident sends Melvin Van Peebles running, a sex show complete with sparklers and a fake beard. Most of the sex scenes just make you wonder if Melvin Van Peebles made this only because he wanted the world to know what his ass looks like. Excuse me--his asssss. What's strange is that Peebles doesn't even seem all that good at sex. He's just kind of ends up on top of women and then doesn't move. It's the same technique that his kid has in that first shocking scene actually. It's implied that his penis is large, but you'd still think you have to, you know, move or something. Not that I'm a sex expert or anything. Anyway, for a movie that is pretty much just Peebles running around with sex scenes interrupting things, you'd think this would get pretty boring, but it's really not. It's like avant-garde sleaze, and with its jump cuts, editing, odd camera angles, hazy psychedelic glaze, 70's grime, and split screen stuff, it might actually be neighbors with El Topo or something. It at least lives in the same neighborhood. I like what Peebles said about the direction for this thing, like they just took everything out of the cupboard and mixed it together. It certainly feels that way, and it's a mess of a movie, but that somehow makes it that much more likable. It's trashy, but it's impressively trashy. If you're close enough to the screen, you almost believe you could get a little bit of Peebles' sweat on you. He wrote this thing, directed, starred, and contracted gonorrhea. He even wrote the music though he wasn't a musician. Earth, Wind, an Fire (before they were Earth, Wind, and Fire, I believe) were the musicians, but never got paid because the check bounced. It's a groovy soundtrack, and its chaos adds to the flavor of the visual chaos. All you really need to hear is that "Come on Feet" song that seems to last for thirty minutes. This movie starts with a "traditional prologue from the Dark Ages": "Sire, these lines are not a homage to brutality that the artist has invented, but a hymn from the mouth of reality." If this is reality, it's an exaggerated and bloated one. Sweet Sweetback's a hyperbole of an anti-hero, and his journey is redundant and dizzying. I suspect that's all intentional however as his story, sadly as relevant now as it was in 1971, is really either the same song or just another verse of the same song.
My favorite scene is a completely random one--a shot of a shoeshine guy who enthusiastically does his job before turning around and giving the guy's foot a top-of-shoe lap dance. I'm not even sure what to call that. I do realize the top of one's shoe is not called a lap. I also liked a wild preacher dude ("That's why the man's down on you!"), an Amazonian biker woman, and finding out about the healing powers of sand and urine. I'm not sure about this movie's ending though. It was really gruesome and hard to watch, and I'm not sure the victims were the right ones.
No, most people who watch this aren't going to think it's great. But it's undeniably a film that consistently challenges, assaults your senses, and sticks to your hippocampus like a used condom.
I am not going to proofread this one.
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