Blaxploitation

characters and themes. Prior to the Blaxploitation era black actors had been relinquished to playing small parts that usually presented stereotyped images of the black race with roles such as waitresses or shoeshine boys. This however all changed when in 1971 when the first successful black film "Sweetback's Baadasss Song" showed a black man coming out on top over the white establishment. The term blaxploitation both helped and destroyed the genre. While many blaxploitation films were box office successes

black audiences everywhere. The films ending, with it's proclamation that "a badasssss nigger is coming back to collect some dues," heralded the arrival of a new era in Hollywood and for blacks in film. “Blaxploitation” was born.      “Blaxploitation” refered to a series of films in which African-American

Angelina Jolie and Charlize Theron, and more specifically the new wave of black female action heroes like Taraji P. Henson, who plays a kick-ass hit woman who's dressed to kill in Proud Mary. Throughout the 1970s, she played the lead in several other Blaxploitation films produced by AIP like Foxy Brown (1974), Sheba Baby, and Friday Foster (which were both released in 1975.) In the late 1970s, the

Pam Grier: The Baddest One-Chick Hit Squad Pamela Suzette Grier was born on May 26TH, 1949 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina to Sylvia Samuels, a nurse, and Clarence Ransom Grier, a mechanic and Technical Sergeant in the US Air Force. She moved frequently throughout her childhood due to her father’s military career, but the family eventually settled in Denver, where she attended both secondary school and college. In order to raise money for tuition for her sophomore year, Grier entered several beauty

able to seemingly integrate elements of Blaxploitation and introduce the film industry’s first interracial buddy comedy. After the Vietnam War and the Civil-Rights Movement, society was ready to engage in a cultural change. In Hollywood, filmmakers began creating “Blaxploitation” films like Foxy Brown and Shaft giving black but urban heroes the ability to be the main attraction. In turn, Blaxploitation was able to set the stage for Blazing Saddles. Blaxploitation emerged from mixing black entertainment

Blaxploitation as Stereotypical Film Blaxploitation, a sub-genre of Exploitation, becomes fairly popular with Hollywood Cinema during the 1960’s and 1970’s. These films initially targeted urbanized youth and began to appeal to African Americans as well as White audiences. However, various groups, such as the Coalition Against Blaxploitation, formed to stop production on films of this genre as it typically portrayed Blacks in a negative way. Generally, there are two different interpretations of Blaxploitation

As Blaxploitation film’s progressed and slowly became divided into genres outside the realm of Blaxploitation, the similarities between Blaxploitation and modern urban film’s are obvious. The same ideals that would cause audiences to fantasize with the plots of Blaxploitation films such as Shaft (1971) and The Mack (1973) would later be evident in more modern film’s such as Scarface, and other film’s that would portray the gangster life in a more glorified sense. However, later films such as New

Blaxploitation is a term coined in the early 1970’s that referred to black films that were aimed at black audiences. These movies were different because it showed black characters and communities as the heroes and as positive images. Before this time, blacks were portrayed in movies as violent and brutal people. Blaxploitation movies were condemned for their stereotypical characterization and violent backgrounds (Allen). Although originated for a black audience, these films were watched by many different

The Dangers of Blaxploitation Films Blaxploitation movies in American society were at an all time high in the 1970’s. They gained popularity during and after the civil rights movement due to the influence African Americans were having on society. The movie Coffy, directed by Jack Hill and release in 1973, is a great example of how Blaxploitation movies reinforced the stereotypes that already exist about black men and women. Young African American filmmakers, made lots of these types of movies in

The Impact Of Blaxploitation films in the black power movement During the 1960s African Americans began to start a black power movement to overcome severe oppression. African Americans during this time in history were being murdered and treated like animals and were not given equal rights. Prior to the black power movement, African Americans were practicing a non-violent civil rights movement that believed in integrated marches and peaceful sit-ins. African Americans before