Black Caesar (1973)

In 1953, young Tommy Gibbs helps a mobster kill his target and then later beaten by a crooked cop. He spends time in prison and in 1965, Tommy (Fred Williamson) takes on a contract from mob boss Cardoza without authority. He convinces Cardoza to give him one full block in exchange for being their secret kill squad. He slowly gains power and influence bringing him in conflict with the ruling Mafia.This remake is surprisingly good. It is violent. Williamson is iconic. The story telling is a bit disjointed. The barbershop scene has some scary violence. The shaky hand with a straight razor is very uncomfortable. There is a ground level edgy reality to all the scenes in Harlem. The most iconic scene is probably Tommy leaving Tiffany. It's obvious filmed guerrilla style. Many of the passerby seems clueless and confused by the action. It would be nice to do more with the other characters. There are great individual scenes like the mobster forcing Tommy to shine his shoe. This is high level blaxploitation.

This is one of those films that not just made Fred Williamson a star but also a iconic figure in the early 1970s. The film does have some flaws such as the acting which to me had many mediocre moments but the film had many great moments that were believable and authentic. I also love Larry Cohen's approach to the film in the 1930's Warner Bro's gangster film fashion which is not to me a bad thing. The thing I loved the most about this particular film was its use of violence and how ugly and horrible it really is but in my personal opinion this a flawed but powerful gangster film that I consider a classic of the genre and a very memorable piece of film making by Larry Cohen.

I've only seen a few vintage "blaxploitation" films, so tonight I'm watching Black Caesar (1973), of interest to me because it was written, directed and produced by ol' Larry Cohen, just a couple years before his inexplicable masterpiece God Told Me To, with the outer space Jesus and the vagina on his chest...that Larry, madman with a camera...Right from the start, the music is top notch! Mainly James Brown, but there's also a cool female-fronted song a girl performs while Fred Williamson shoots up a room fulla white folks. Williamson is probably the only good actor in the whole film, but who can read Larry Cohen's dialogue, in any movie, and come off sounding real. All his movies have such cartoony dialogue, but that's part of the charm of his stuff (other than Q and a coupla others just too awful to recall). Most of the characters in Black Caesar are hollow and soul-less anyway, so the junior high acting doesn't distract. Williamson is good enough to make up for the others -I really didn't know what to expect going into it, so it was pretty astonishing to see Williamson smear shoe polish on a guy and make him sing "Mammy"!! A Larry Cohen moment I'll certainly never forget ---Despite all the grindhouse schlock - all of which I love! - there's a solid little story. The scenes with Williamson breaking his mom's heart and then facing off with his neglectful dad shows Cohen was going for more than machine guns and chase scenes. And, again, the music - wow! Even the most incidental bits of background music are smokin', and perfectly suited to the frequent NYC exteriors.So now I've seen three or four blaxploitation flicks, and part of one other, Scream Blackula Scream, which was so bad that it caused me actual pain, so I shut it off...(for some reason, I can't handle anything with VooDoo, it freaks me out with all the animal mutilation and stuff, hence me never seeing Angel Heart, Serpent and the Rainbow, etc).So far, Black Ceasar is the best I've seen of this genre ---

The saga of Fred Williamson as he rises from a kid running errands for the Mob to a gang leader in Harlem. A crazy operatic structure that treads just on this side of absurdity, but manages for the most part not to go over the edge. Williamson is excellent, especially in that he doesn't take the cheap way out and make his character a hero. While he's often sympathetic, it's also clear he's a nasty piece of work. Classic James Brown soundtrack. The big climax, particularly the "shoeshine" sequence, is absolutely jaw-dropping. Lots of action and some gratuitous nudity, always a plus. Interestingly, one of the few blaxploitation movies I've seen where white racism isn't just a surface gloss, but rather an integral part of the storyline. I can't speak enough about this movie, highly recommended.