To me, this movie is perfection.

Sadly Over-hyped

Excellent but underrated film

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The only saving grace in this pointless sequel is having as always the great Fred Williamson back in one of his greatest roles: Black Caesar. They even mention him as that at one point because in the original he was never called that.Where do I begin to even explain this as I said pointless sequel. The original one was superb and should have just ended at that. This so-called sequel begins literally where the original ended except they changed the ending! I had the privilege to see the original in it's unedited glory with the original ending where Tommy Gibbs dies at the hands of a group of thug kids who beat the living hell out of him and supposedly he dies when he attempts to go hide out with the ledgers in his old abandoned neighborhood. In this sequel they just completely eliminate that great ending and make it where he survives by calling his dad!? The late great Julius Harris returns as Papa Gibbs as well as the beautiful Gloria Hendry as Helen and well as the late great D'Urville Martin as Reverend Rufus.I feel the Julius got a bigger and better role in this one and it's quite a funny sight to see him just change from being a regular gentleman Mr. Gibbs to the "Superfly-ish" Big Papa. He makes quite a convincing gangster/thug. Gloria & D'Urville where just wasted in the meager roles and Gloria basically gets strangled in a alley because she was reduced to being a prostitute. Even the great Fred Williamson barely rode on his charisma alone on this one but for me just did not achieve what the far superior original did. The only good part Fred had was towards the end when he takes on the whole mob by himself in a one-man army type of thing. We also get to see Fred doing a lot of running and showing his still at the time physical agility and skill as a sprinter/runner. The musical score on this sequel was way inferior to the superb score James Brown did in the original. To me the music alone on the original made the picture. Here, it was not bad but was completely lacking in the way Brown did his score.Of the new characters only the lovely Margaret Avery as Sister Jennifer and Tony King as the treacherous enforcer Zach made a impression on me.All in all not a bad film but not a good one either. I will watch and re-watch the original "Black Caesar" over and over and never get tired of it but this sequel? No way. One time viewing was enough.

This film might not be as popular as its predecessor "Black Caesar," but "Hell Up in Harlem" is far more explosive. This movie was my introduction to Fred "the Hammer" Williamson, and it's one of his best movies. Not much of a story, but the action level is awesome. Plus, this movie is far less preachy and depressing than "Black Caesar." Great supporting roles played by Durville Martin and Julius Harris, and a cool theme song by Edwin "War" Starr. Action highlights include the opening chase scene (which pretty much disregards the first film's bleak conclusion), the island shootout and of course the hard to believe NYC to L.A. chase! If you're new to the Hammer, start with this movie. It's definitely his best.

**DEFINITE SPOILERS** This film is a direct sequel to "Black Caeser". The first 7 minutes show the ending of the first film in which Caeser (Fred Williamson) was being chased and then beaten to death. This movie conveniently ignores that he was killed and has his father rescuing him. He survives and kills all the people that double-crossed him. He then tries to go legit...but his past won't stay away. **END SPOILERS**The first movie was dull and stupid--it just had some violence and a good performance by Williamson to keep it going. This sequel was made quickly (it shows) and is REAL stupid--but it's never dull. The plot moves very fast and there's tons of violence and plenty of blood. All the violence is pretty funny--it's ineptly staged and obviously faked with some hilariously bad post dubbing. The acting is bad except for Williamson and this actually left room for another sequel (which thankfully never happened).This is a pretty bad movie but I was never bored--all the action and violence kept me entertained. If you liked the first you'll probably like this. I give it a 5.

Fred Williamson reprises his role in the sequel to one of the more well-known flicks of the blaxploitation genre. I found this to be a more entertaining film than it's predecessor because it could concentrate more on the action as the characters and their back stories were developed in Black Caesar. This time the focus is on both Tommy and his father (Julius Harris) and how they take their territory back after the events of the first movie. The beginning was a little awkward as it rewrote the final few minutes of Black Ceasar but from there, the film evolved into a revenge story as Tommy tracked down the people who did him wrong. There were a number of great action scenes including Tommy and his mini-army storming a mob hangout on an island and a cross-country chase scene that would make the contenders on "The Amazing Race" envious.I found that director Larry Cohen was a lot more comfortable with the characters this time around and I enjoyed seeing Harris with an expanded role. Still, I think that it would have been extremely challenging being a white director such as Cohen or Jack Hill with a predominantly black cast in that particular era. The score was by Edwin Starr (who is most known for the song "War") and was pretty good even though I would have preferred another score from James Brown. Brown was initially involved but his score ended up being scrapped but thankfully was still released as one of my favorite albums from the Godfather of Soul entitled "The Payback".