“But Black Dynamite I sell drugs in the community!”

Dynamite! Dynamite! Before I get into this review of possibly the greatest spoof to cross the silver screen in the last decade or two, I feel that I should explain blaxploitation. After watching Black Dynamite and hurting myself beyond hope with laughter, I thought about why it is that I found the movie hilarious and why younger, uncultured audience members may not get it. Having seen reviews with comments about the humor being off and the timing just not working, I realized that if you aren’t a child of the 80s or a student of the black upliftment era of the 70s you may not know what it is you are watching. While most people know who Shaft is, mainly due to the Samuel L. Jackson remake and know what an afro is, they may not know anything about the older movies and their importance to the inner-city moviegoers of the 70s. What Black Dynamite is, is a spoof of an age old genre that has been long gone but far from forgotten by people like myself. The timing is perfect, from Michael Jai White’s non-smiling, tough delivery, to his sequined, denim suits and clean afro. Salli Richardson-Whitfield is an afro goddess with the hair large, her figure pert and her black power act resounding through her lines. She and most of the cast seemed to have been plucked right off of the screen of an original 1970s flick and that ain’t no jive I’m laying on you.

So blaxploitation fans and Kung Fu theater aficionados rejoice, Scott Sanders brings you the meanest, baddest, motherf-cker to ever grace both worlds, the man Black Dynamite, in a comedy spoof of tremendous adoration. The 70s brought on many black movies meant to show positive alternatives (and some that are now regarded as negative) to the standard Hollywood fare of the day. Well known movies like Shaft, The Mack, Little Ceasor,  Super Fly and Willie Dynamite are only a few in a vast library of low budget movies made to supply the demand of inner-city black people who wanted to see themselves on the big screen. The imported kung fu movies that were popular at the time influenced quite a few of the actors to showcase their own (extremely bad) martial arts. Bruce Lee was one of the more influential characters, featuring a few men with minimal skills in films such as Return of The Dragon and extremely skilled men like Jim Kelly (a hero of Blaxploitation) in Enter the Dragon. Men like Rudy Ray Moore would cash in with Dolemite, The Disco Godfather and Petey Wheatstraw The Devil’s Son In Law. If you’ve seen any of the Dolemites you will probably remember the slow roundhouses, bad editing and rhyming speech that made Moore popular. In these types of movies, the liberal, inner-city black people didn’t see superheroes dressed in tights, they saw superheroes who favored guys in the barbershop, pool hall and discos. Men who could sleep with 10 women at a time, escape unscathed from chaotic shootouts and knew the right things to say to keep the people uplifted and the man down. They saw strong women who kept razor blades in their afro in case a bitch dare grab it and could pull a trigger as tightly as any man could. This is the genre that brought us women like Pam Grier’s Foxy Brown and Tamara Dobson’s Cleopatra Jones.

A few years back Eddie Griffin released Undercover Brother and I loved the blaxploitation references throughout. The black fist medallion, the super fro, foxy sidekick and Cadillac were all the right elements. Yet somehow it was a bit too commercial, Kris Kattan was too over the top and the Brotherhood was not as impactful as they intended. Plus to mention the fact that the legendary Jim Kelly’s cameo was cut from the final reel (BLASPHEMY!!!) Still it was a good try at reviving the old memories and it resides firmly in my collection till this day. Black Dynamite however, not only gives you the old feelings of that age-old blaxploitation movie, but also the camp, innuendos and cheesiness involved. You get afros of all sizes, corrupt black politicians and pimps bumping heads with the black freedom fighters. There are shady, big money white men plot schemes to damage the black youth and corrupt police are there to enforce the law. You have a black superhero archetype in Black Dynamite (Michael Jai White), a kickass theme song and a crazy story of corruption, double-crosses and revenge. The man’s mission you may ask? What would a black superhero from the inner city want to do? To rid the streets of the pimps, players and the prostitutes and start all over of course!

Black Dynamite is one of those rare gems that will not get a lot of attention because of the type of humor that it conveys.  Many people just won’t get it and that’s a damn shame, a damn shame I tell ya! However, it is on limited showing but if it makes its way to your neck of the woods make it a mission to go out and see it.

When the brother of Black Dynamite is killed in a shootout involving CIA agents and drug dealers, Black Dynamite makes an oath to find the killers and anyone involved with it. Due to a promise made to his dying mother to keep his brother out of trouble, Black Dynamite feels full responsibility for the death and begins to crack down on local street gangs, pimps and prostitutes. Finding out that the CIA is involved (to which he was once employed), he reunites with them in order to regain his “License to Kill” and sets out to clean up the streets for answers. Along the way he meets Gloria (Salli Richardson), a foxy lady who runs an orphanage with a mission to help the inner city youth. Assisting Gloria by completely cleaning up the streets, Black Dynamite then unites with the black power movement and sets out to crack the puzzle behind his brother’s death. What he eventually finds leads to the highest of powers, not limited to the fiendish Dr. Wu (Roger Yuan) and his Kung Fu treachery. His only weapons are his fists of fury, his well oiled nun chucks and his huge magnum – but are these enough for a man like Black Dynamite to take on The Man, in a complicated quest to avenge his brother’s death?

I have to give it up to Tommy Davidson who plays Cream Corn, Brian Mcknight as Sweetmeat (yes I laughed at that too), and Arsenio Hall as Tasty Freeze. To be honest, all of the cast members did an excellent job in spoofing the attitudes and methodology of the era. Do I have a complaint? Well certain scenes needed a bit of reworking, some things came off as a bit too modern from the speech but these are so minimal they do not warrant discussion. But I must bring up the score, it was spot on in the way Curtis Mayfield used to do it for Super Fly and movies like The Mack. Back then the songs would cater neatly to the scene at hand and incorporate the main characters name and actions (you have to watch and listen to it), this is hilarious but a minor detail that I am glad was incorporated.

If you are only seeing one comedy this year, make it Black Dynamite. If you are lucky enough to have it in your city, it is worth the price of admission to split your gut with laughter. The tough Michael Jai White aka Spawn a comedian? Who would’ve thunk it, still he is absolutely phenomenal as the charismatic Black Dynamite. Like Undercover Brother before it, I am eagerly in anticipation of a sequel and a return to the blaxploitation ass-kicking .

  STAR RATING: (10/10)   ★★★★★★★★★★