Word: shaft
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Even according to the dismal standards established by predecessors like Cool Breeze, Super Fly seems remarkably exploitative and inept. Director Gordon Parks Jr. (his father is the photojournalist turned film maker who directed the two Shaft movies) cuts to a shot of the fancy grillwork on Priest's car whenever he does not know what else to do. Thus there is an abundance of grillwork shots. This is Parks' first feature, and some faults are customary under such circumstances. But Super Fly shows no evidence of perception, intelligence or sensitivity; there is only a kind of frivolous opportunism...
...urban movie houses and treating ethnic audiences to fantasy visions previously only colored white. Machismo, even in its white variety, is a hideous subject for glorification. But the black supermen in these movies roister about the contemporary cityscape like hyper Sam Spades without the Hammett moral sense. Sweetback or Shaft are totally ruthless people, oppressed by whites but equally disgusted by the lack of effectiveness of black community and cultural leaders. They are agents who wish to be totally free, and are concerned solely with their personal vendettas against the rest of the world. Until Super Fly, the hardened Chester...
GORDON PARKS JR. has directed from a Philip Henty script. Parks, who did some special photography for Burn and The Godfather, and who is the son of the Life photographer and creator of Shaft, far surpasses his father in filmmaking vigor in this, his first feature. It's all pretty crude, but he keeps things rolling, manages to cool off more obvious hot elements while keeping the cold liquid, and with crisp photography brings us closer into Harlem's high and low life than any of the bigger-budgeted current black flicks. (Not to mention that the effect he gets...
...world for all of us." During performances with the Hampton Jazz Inner Circle, the composer passes out singles of his new ditty while the boys play Hampton specialties. What happens when Democrats disapprove of his offering? "Oh," says Hampton's manager, "for them we play the theme from Shaft...
...Shaft's Big Score--Gary Theater. 10 a.m.-10 p.m. every two hours...