Really Surprised!

From my favorite movies..

I was totally surprised at how great this film.You could feel your paranoia rise as the film went on and as you gradually learned the details of the real situation.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

A biker race fight develops when Eddie (Robert Howard) is killed by white bikers for dating a white girl. The claim to fame for this film is that it has six NFL stars in the feature with Joe Greene being the most recognized name in the modern era. Outside of Gene Washington, the speaking roles for the players were limited as their acting was as bad as their white counterparts in the film.Guide: Brief nudity (Rosalind Miles)

Start with a trite script, add a no-talent cast, mix in a white director who clearly did not understand Blaxploitation, and you have THE BLACK 6. Or as I call it, "The Anti-Shaft."Eddie Daniels is a Black high school senior with a white girlfriend. When her brother Moose (yes, Moose) and his biker pals beat Eddie to death, his brother Bubba (yes, Bubba) comes to town with his own biker pals. Bubba's there mainly to see his mother and sister but takes the law into his own hands when the police show no interest in solving the murder.The title characters were all played by NFL stars. As actors, they were great football players. Not that the rest of the cast is any better--especially the nice old lady who hires the men as temporary farm workers, and the hysterical white woman whose diner they trash when its racist clientele insults them. Then there's Bubba's humorless, militant sister with an Afro that would have embarrassed Angela Davis. Or as one of the Black 6 puts it, "Man, you got one heavy little sister." (She's not fat.) And Bubba's old girlfriend, who's now a hooker, delivers a monologue that's beyond belief.Finally, the ending doesn't make a damned bit of sense. I watched the final scene three times but still couldn't figure out what happened. At first, I thought the Black 6 had all been killed, but then a message appears on-screen: HONKY...LOOK OUT...HASSLE A BROTHER...AND THE BLACK 6 WILL RETURN!!! All I know is, the cataclysm entailed chains, flares, explosions, dozens of loud motorcycles, and a whole lot of dead bikers. And yet, the cops never show up. Must have been their night off.

If it's at all possible, this one's even worse than THE BLACK GESTAPO (1975; see above): it concerns the revenge perpetrated by the free-spirited, peace-loving but ultimately tough brother (and his five equally brawny cronies) of a black man killed by a group of bikers for daring to go out with a white girl. The title characters are played by a variety of American Football stars but, apart from the novelty factor, this does the film no good as none of them can act - not that the rest of the cast is any better, as witness the old woman for whom they work early on in the film or the hysterical owner of the roadhouse diner they end up trashing after being insulted by their racist clientele! Even at this juncture, I can hardly remember anything about it - except for the exaggerated Afro hairstyle of the lead character's radical younger sister who rebukes him for going off on their bikes rather than joining the Black Cause - after which one of the guys tells him, "Ma-aaa-n, you have one he-aaaa-vy li'l sistah!" Also, the print I watched was so muddy and dark that, due to the characters' skin color, I could hardly distinguished one from the other, especially during the climactic fight!! There's also an eccentric white biker named Thor who, appropriately enough, dons a Viking helmet but I have no idea what he really had to do with the main plot at the end of it! Finally, the end credits show a hilarious title card which warns white "honkies" that if they "hassle a brother", they'll find the Black Six on their heels...or something! The director later made the intriguing horror film THE WITCH WHO CAME FROM THE SEA (1976) - whose R1 SE DVD from Subversive Cinema I've been eyeing for purchase for the longest time - but, after watching this piece of trash, I'll think twice before going for it as a blind buy...

Matt Climber brought us the underrated "Butterfly" with Stacy Keach and Pia Zadora , but this seems to be the turkey that they should have talked about. Now im not saying that a young white director cannot make a film that revolves around predominatly black characters , but Climber cannot. From the old 70's blaxploitation school of white directors with some issues of their own that need to be dealt with this is of the same ilk. Bad script , Bad idea , there are dozens of similar films made a damn site better and without making the leads into uncle toms for the audience. Poor