The boom period of exploitation in the USA brought forward probably the most criticised yet progressive wing of the exploitation genre, Blaxploitation, it was an ethnic subgenre born out of the black power movement, with 1971s Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song being one of the first films which portrayed a strong ideology of black power allowing African American actors to forefront their own stories and narratives as opposed to the usual comic relief or stereotypical roles.
Films like Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song and more famously Shaft (1971) have been named as the first Blaxploitation movies by Varity Magazine after the NAACP (The Los Angeles National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People) coined the phrase upon their releases, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song and Shaft both containing themes of solidarity, and social awareness alongside the typical exploitation content of violence and sex.
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With the knowledge that film had the ability to create change both culturally and socially, the Black Power civil rights movement took the genre and ran with it to help spotlight the struggles of black people in America throughout the 1970s, many of these films starred black protagonists who managed to overcome the regular oppression of the history and culture of African Americans however films such as 1972s Superfly toned down the themes of black power, instead spurring resistance against the idea of the capitalist system instead if the radical metamorphosis of modern American society, and they were also easier for the general movie going public, to digest.
However, Superfly did end up garnering support for the black nationalist party by the imagery and theme that a black and white authority cannot exist side by side without problems and conflict.
Motion pictures like Shaft ended up receiving intense criticism for the stereotype of the films main character John Shaft (based on the generalization that all pimps are African-American males), but also garnered criticism for portrayal that all black communities are run down and hotspots for crime and drug running. However many motion pictures from the blaxploitation genre did open the door for many African American people to work in what was majorly a white ran industry, with people like Fred Williamson writing on films like The Black Bounty Killer (1975) and all black casts and crews on films like Blacula (1972) which was directed by William Craine, one of the first black film school graduates to achieve major success.
Although this genre ended up dying towards the start of the 80s, it left its mark on modern cinema, with exploitation film fan Quentin Tarantino paying homage to the genre repeatedly in his films, a prime example is Jackie Brown(1997), which starred blaxploitation legend Pam Grier who made her name in blaxploitation classics Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974). Tarantinos Django Unchained is also steeped in homage to Blaxploitation,
In The Black Bounty Killer (usually known as Boss N*gger), Fred Williamson wrote and starred as a black bounty hunter who takes on a small oppressive mid-western town with his firearms. Which of course played well with the black moviegoers during the height of the black power era.
Even though Tarantino's movie is appealing to a much wider interracial audience, however its plot, the story of a black man who faces and defeats the slave drivers who tortured and oppressed him and his wife is taken clean from the blaxploitation playbook.
A Shaft reboot was released in 2000 starring Samuel L Jackson, and was a modern take on the genre of blaxploitation, and films such as Hoodlum (1997) and American Gangster (2007) contain a plethora of elements which are of a similar style to blaxploitation cinema, with Hoodlum being a blaxploitation homage set in the 30s and American Gangster which is set in 1970s Harlem, contains the song Across 110th Street, which was used in the 1972 film of the same name, this is reference to the movie which took massive inspiration from the blaxploitation movement as it was happening.
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