The So-Called Fall of Blaxploitation

Guerrero, Ed.  2009. The So-Called Fall of Blaxploitation.  The Velvet Light Trap (University of Texas Press).  64: 90-91.

Ed Guerrero, a noted film scholar and historian, documents the fall in popularity (and financing) of blaxploitation films as part of The Velvet Light Trap’s series on “Perspectives on Failure”. Guerrero attributes the decline of blaxploitation to several factors: disinterest in funding by major studios who are mainly interested in larger, quick profits,  formulaic plots , resistance from  black activist organizations, and finally, Hollywood studios use of blaxploitation to save the film industry from bankruptcy in order to finance larger blockbusters (such as The Godfather). In essence, black actors, directors and writers were used and tossed aside due to profit and lack of interest. Furthermore, audiences for “mainstream” films became overwhelming black; therefore, studios felt that there was no need for films with black interests in mind (91).

In agreeing with Guerrero, I also feel that although blaxploitation is “dead” in a sense of financing from studios and also being somewhat culturally irrelevant as a genre, the genre does deserve critical examination as an important genre of film. In essence, the genre is responsible for many of the motifs we see in hip-hop music, gangster films, and were influential to other African-American film makers (such as Robert Townsend and Keenan Ivory Wayans-both who did spoofs of blaxploitation films).  I am also interested in what the article does not address: How did the fall of blaxploitation affect working actors, particularly the African-American women who had difficulty finding parts in “mainstream” films but found much success via the genre? What has been the impact of blaxploitation on the perceptions of African-American female audiences who were witness a virtual “white washing” of films for years after blaxploitation ended?

Film as a Medium to Study the Twentieth-Century Afro-American Experience

Hyatt, Marshall and Cheryl Sanders. 1984.  Film as a Medium to Study the Twentieth-Century Afro-American Experience. The Journal of Negro Education.  53 (2): 161-172

Written almost 25 years ago, Hyatt and Sanders advocate for courses on African-American film to teach the African-American experience (as employed by their own African-American studies department at Harvard University) and examine social historical and political implications of each film. They outline a clear, pedagogical approach for a course that would combine reading (several non-fiction texts from Fred Silva and Daniel J. Leab as well as fiction that reflects the time/era) and chronological film studies (From 1920s- early 1980’s).  In addition, Hyatt and Sanders give a historical account of the rise of African-American film making as a response to D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation as well as modern cinematic responses to historical climate (such as blaxploitation being a response and reflection of Black Power movements).  The information is cursory and serves simply as a basis for the type of films that a course on African-American film could possibly cover.

As a future professor of English with research interests in both film and literature, I found this helpful in formulating future syllabi and lesson plans for discussions, critiques of  the intersection film and literature. The section on blaxploitation was short and gives a short critique on the genre as being seen as negative, glorifying violence and ghetto societies. However, there is no suggestion of using these films in conjunction with literature and examining the historical climate (civil rights movements, black power movements, etc) that lead to the development of the genre as a whole. I see a definite void that could be filled with a class on Blaxploitation and feminism, for example or blaxploitation and advocacy issues. I am aware that this article is much older than previous ones and lays a foundation for such a course, but I have yet to see many universities employ this model in teaching courses on film; therefore,  it may be a bit outdated.

(Note: Baruch College, CUNY in New York does have a special topics class on blaxploitation that combines  modern rhetoric/ technical composition techniques we have discussed such as podcasting, blogging, and contemporary cinema theory for undergraduate students which I feel is a fresh approach.)

The Ruse of Engagement: Black Masculinity and the Cinema of Policing

Sexton, Jared. 2009. The Ruse of Engagement: Black Masculinity and the Cinema of Policing. American Quarterly. 61 (1): 39-63

Sexton’s article addresses the intersection of black masculinity within films that deal with elements of “policing” and crime in the film industry. He uses director Antoine Fuqua’s Training Day starring Denzel Washington as a case study (although I argue that this is an accurate description of his analyses and methodology) in the discussion of perceptions of black “maleness” within the realms of cinema. In his assessment, Sexton analyzes past films with strong male leads, especially those starring Sidney Poitier made during the height of blaxploitation film making. Specifically, Sexton analyzes films in which black men are in positions of authority (i.e. police, detectives, investigators, etc) and how this was in stark contrast of society’s view of African-American men as subservient, threatening, unauthorized and unarmed (43). Comparatively, Sexton aligns the film making of Fuqua to those early blaxploitation film makers and discusses several ways in which modern films (particularly those with elements of policing/crime./authority) address similar issues of race, gender and sexuality.

I was particularly interested in several issues this article raises with respect to my own research interest.  The article raises issues of gender and sexuality with regard to African-American men in roles of “policing” yet there is no discussion of African-American women in those same roles. A good strategy in talking about  black masculinity in film is to juxtapose it against the display of “masculinity” in female roles of authority and policing.  There is only a cursory (albeit obligatory) mention of African-American women actors, specifically Halle Berry, and the message her role in Monster’s Ball may have sent with regards to gender and sexuality. The article is good in its assessment of masculinity in black cinema but fails in comparatively analyzing both male and female roles. It would have made the argument of black masculinity being subverted a lot stronger if  the subject was compared with similar female roles.

The Media as a System of Racialization: Exploring Images of African American Women and the New Racism

Bounds-Littlefield, Marci.  2008.  The Media as a System of Racialization: Exploring Images of African American Women and the New Racism. American Behavioral Scientist. 51 (4): 675-685.

Marci Bounds Littlefield’s historical, qualitative study “The Media as a System of Racialization: Exploring Images of African American Women and New Racism” (2008) raises criticism around issues of media (including cinema) as a polarizing force in the image of African-American woman and offers solutions (albeit limited) as to how educators can help change this dynamic of “new racism”.   This “new racism” assumes that because we have achieved equality in the eyes of mainstream America that issues of racism and sexism are non-existent. Ideas of sexual equality and empowerment are negated my current images of hypersexualized, marginalized African-American women. Littlefield uses the media as the example of those who perpetuate ideas of race and gender in negative ways and bases much of her criticism in the theory of Patricia Collins Hill’s notions and lens of black feminist dialogue.

Historically. Littlefield covers representations of women in early forms of media such as D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation as well as other images of African-American women in positions of servitude and disenfranchised. Furthermore, she also includes modern interpretations of images of African-American women such as highly-sexually suggestive rap videos. What is lacking, however, is a critical view of images that occurred during a time frame between those extremes such as blaxploitation films. Littlefield doesn’t acknowledge that those blaxploitation films are often the basis of highly sexualized rap video images of pimping, manipulation and exploitation of women, and black masculinity defined as material wealth and sexual conquest. Although she stresses that there has to be context in which black men are not conditioned to view black women in this manner and educators are key to change, she does not offer any solutions with regards to media and popular culture helping to change that dynamic.

Women of Blaxploitation: How the Black Action Film Heroine Changed American Popular Culture

Sims, Yvonne D.  2006.  Women of Blaxploitation: How the Black Action Film Heroine Changed American Popular Culture.  Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company

Although written a few years before Stephane Dunn’s book, Yvonne Sims also tackles the subject of black women in blaxploitaiton film from a feminist film theory lens. However, she also gives critical analysis on their impact on popular American culture as a whole and not relegating it to simply the African-American experience. Her argument is that by reshaping notions of African-American femininity and gender blaxploitation films allowed for all women to be seen in less marginalized ways in mainstream action films. There is a comprehensive history of early race films and their use of stereotypical tropes such as Aunt Jemima, Mammy and other domesticated roles. She also employs the sociological and cultural lenses of Patricia Hills Collins, Bell Hooks, and other noteworthy African-American feminist critics as the basis for her analysis of women in blaxploitation.

Other than the introduction, Sims’s book is less narrative and is a strictly critical, qualitative analysis of blaxploitaiton films. Sims does a thorough job of analyzing roles played by Pam Grier and Tamara Dobson as well as their high sexualized, yet power-centered roles’ impact on mainstream action heroines (such as Sigourney Weaver in Alien). The chapter on Pam Grier as the “queen of blaxploitation” (71) is particularly interesting and critical of her oversexualized portrayals of African-American women, yet Sims praises her as a trailblazer in being the most bankable African-American actress of the 1970s and as an unconventional, empowering super-heroine.   Tamara Dobson is analyzed as the antithesis of many of Grier’s characters, not using blatant, irrelevant nudity and sexual overtones to sell the image of strength, femininity, empowerment, and social consciousness (94). The only weakness of the book is that there isn’t a clear correlation between the end of blaxploitation films and the rise of mainstream films (perhaps other than lack of interest and white directors employing blaxploitaiton themes to more mainstream films with mainstream actresses). Again, much of that is inferred from the text and not explicit.