Hit! (1973)

I have to say, that image of a tailored Billy Dee Williams holding a rocket launcher is a beautiful sight; but blaxploitation this is not."Hit!" plays like a straightforward drama and its star, much closer to Bronson or Eastwood, brings the intensity as a grieving father whose daughter just O.D.'d. the movie has its eye on commentary as Williams and his DIY strike team take the drug war to the kingpins at the top. There are lighter moments - like the McDonald's product placement and Richard Pryor ad-libbing his end of the dialogue - and the pacing isn't perfect, but this is a pleasant surprise. I knew I'd like this, but for different reasons altogether. 7/10

This has come out on DVD in April 2012. I had been looking for this for a long time. I hadn't seen it in nearly 25 years and I am surprised how well it has aged.So, here we are with a piece of cinema that was well ahead of it's time (and still his) as far as inter-racial relationships is concerned. Even Denzel has not had the intestinal fortitude to go where Billy Dee Williams has gone: falling in love with a gorgeous white woman in the person of Gwen Welles.Sexy and tender: this would be exceptional in 2012, but it was done in 1973! Hit! is a great story that doesn't shy away from character development. It quietly builds itself in 135 short minutes.Of course it has its flaws like all the B+ stuff, but boy would I like to see a remake of this.It has all the ingredients of a Stallone flick: losers humbly redeem themselves doing extraordinary things in so brief instants where their whole existence must past in front of them.It was like I knew - and fell in love with - every character.A tour de force by Sidney Furie that would be difficult to duplicate using modern standards.Still, I would love to see this one remade.

I had prepared a long in-depth comparison between this film and Steven Soderbergh's vastly overrated 2001 film - two films with similar subject matter of the U.S. War on Drugs, but unfortunately that review got erased. My basic point was that Soderbergh's film purported to be a serious, realistic saga on the conflict between the U.S government and the illegal Mexican drug system, but was in fact a collection of pretentious, meandering plot lines, with the plot line involving the U.S. Drug Czar's cocaine-addict honor student daughter being the most ridiculous. That film also reached no definite conclusion about the U.S.'s War on Drugs.Conversely, the now-obscure film "Hit!" on the surface appears to be one of many blaxploitation/vigilante movies from the 1970s but successfully rises above its pulp origins to become a semi-serious commentary on U.S. drug policies with stellar acting from Billy Dee Williams, Richard Pryor, Warren Kemmerling, and virtually everyone else. Williams carefully organizes a diverse "A-Team"-like group of misfits to destroy the French heroin cartel and its importation into the U.S. following the death of his daughter from a fatal overdose. Though often witty, this film never loses sight of the seriousness of the drug problem, and in fact reaches a very definite conclusion: the U.S. government really could stop the drug trade if it wised-up, went after the people at the top rather than small-time pushers, and "got off its ass," as a resigned Williams states at the end.Though other reviews criticize the film's length (which is just over two hours), I enjoyed director's Furie's decision to carefully develop all the minor characters here. This movie has excellent production values. As usual, Furie is a master at setting up scenes visually, and the final assassinations prove to be very suspenseful and impressive. This is a film that deserves a second look, and has earned my recommendation.

...and in fact, Hit! is an ambitious mixture of action and character study. At 134 minutes, one might suspect the director of overweening pride, but in fact there's little in the way of flab here. Billy Dee Williams proves that he should have been a major star and Richard Pryor is, as always, brilliant. Add a terrific supporting cast (Warren Kemmerling, Paul 'They Came From Within' Hampton, Sid Munson), a host of slimy French drug dealers, and a heaping dollop of revenge for a thoroughly satisfying blast of 70s-style crime dramatics.