The title of the documentary film that Elvis Mitchell will present at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center this Friday, Is That Black Enough for You?!?, deserves an explanation. Yes, it refers to the doc’s subject matter: movies starring Black actors that were a new and exciting part of the American movie scene from 1968 to 1978.
But there’s also a story behind the origin of that phrase. It comes from the 1970 action-comedy Cotton Comes to Harlem, based on a detective novel by Chester Himes and directed by Ossie Davis. In the movie, several characters—played by cast members Godfrey Cambridge, Calvin Lockhart, Raymond St. Jacques, Redd Foxx, and others—repeatedly say the catchphrase “Is that Black enough for you?” “That one line that repeats itself throughout is fantastic,” says Laurence Fishburne, one of the actors featured in Mitchell’s on-screen interviews. “It resonates.”
Mitchell is a writer and interviewer who served as a film critic for several newspapers, including The New York Times. He has wide-ranging movie tastes and vast film knowledge, but he has a special love for the subject of Is That Black Enough for You?!? “I think I’ve always been interested in movies and understand the impact they have around the world,” he says in a phone interview. “They really start a conversation.”
The movies that become grouped under the term Blaxploitation changed the film industry because they were doing so well with audiences, Mitchell explains. “What was called ‘Black Pride’ was happening in such a big way. Most were not written or directed by Black people, but they allowed creative talent, especially actors, to bring positive lives to films in a way that hadn’t been seen before.”
Among other memorable aspects of these films is that their signature songs often were intended to propel widespread interest so radio listeners would subsequently go to the movie. Black music stars provided the soundtracks, a big selling point. Isaac Hayes’ “Theme from Shaft” (1971) was so distinctive that it won an Oscar. “That song was bigger than the movie,” says Mitchell. “People think they’ve seen the movie because they’ve heard the song.”
Singer/songwriter Curtis Mayfield created huge hits for Super Fly (1972); for Let’s Do It Again, a 1975 action comedy directed by and starring Sidney Poitier, with Bill Cosby a featured actor; and for A Piece of the Action (1977), another Poitier/Cosby pairing. “As a composer, he was always writing from the point of view of the characters,” Mitchell says of Mayfield. “He realized a songscape could have the same kind of dramatic life as the actors in a film. I don’t think we have the Bee Gees songs for Saturday Night Fever (1977) without having his songs first.”
Many of the Black films of this era have titles that might make one wary that violent action-movie exploitation waits ahead: Black Gestapo; Black Samson; Black Mama, White Mama; Black Caesar; Black Godfather; Hell Up in Harlem. When Blaxploitation came into widespread use to describe them, it wasn’t particularly meant as praise.
Mitchell points out that the widely released action films provided their audiences with strong Black heroes, an important innovation in an artform that had long held back such roles. Many of them showcased actors who were powerfully dynamic, such as Pam Grier, Richard Roundtree, and Max Julien.
Mitchell worries that the Blaxploitation term came to dampen the reputations—and even our memories—of movies that had stories centering on more ordinary Black lives. Two notable examples, he says, are Claudine, a 1974 romantic comedy about a single mother in Harlem that netted Diahann Carroll a Best Actress Oscar nomination, and Sounder (1972), about a sharecropping family in rural Louisiana that brought Oscar nominations for Cicely Tyson (Best Actress), Paul Winfield (Best Actor), and Lonne Elder III (Best Adapted Screenplay). Sounder was also nominated for Best Picture.
Other films had a significant political impact at the time and still matter. One example is the 1971 thriller Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, which was written and directed by and starred Melvin Van Peebles. When the film received an X rating, Van Peebles proudly promoted it as “Rated X by an all-white jury.” “Melvin wanted something provocative and political,” says Mitchell. “It gave people a way to think about why movies get the ratings they do.”
Blaxploitation has since become a neutral term, even a positive one, for many younger film and Pop/Black culture buffs, but there’s a sizable population that still sees the term as negative. So should it stop being used? “There are lots of films that I agree are exploitation, but using the term becomes a way to give short shrift to a big moment in Black culture,” Mitchell says. “My problem with the word is it becomes this rubric that gives definition to every Black film of the period. And that’s just not true. I think in part Blaxploitation is used as a kind of celebration of their commercial success, though the word can also be used to laugh those movies off and say in a way that they’re all the same story. So it’s definitely something I’m of two minds about.”
The film screening will be followed by a live conversation between Mitchell and tt stern-enzi, artistic director of the Over-the-Rhine International Film Festival. Get tickets and more information here.
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