Jackie Brown is a 1997 American crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, based on the 1992 novel Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard. It stars Pam Grier as Jackie Brown, a flight attendant who smuggles money between the United States and Mexico. Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster, Bridget Fonda, Michael Keaton, and Robert De Niro appear in supporting roles.
Billy Jack is a 1971 American action drama independent film, the second of four films centering on a character of the same name which began with the movie The Born Losers (1967), played by Tom Laughlin, who directed and co-wrote the script. Filming began in Prescott, Arizona, in the fall of 1969, but the movie was not completed until 1971. American International Pictures pulled out, halting filming. 20th Century Fox came forward and filming eventually resumed but when that studio refused to distribute the film, Warner Bros. stepped forward.
Pamela Suzette Grier is an American actress and singer. Described by Quentin Tarantino as cinema's first female action star, she achieved fame for her starring roles in a string of 1970s action, blaxploitation and women in prison films for American International Pictures and New World Pictures. Her accolades include nominations for an Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, a Satellite Award and a Saturn Award.
Foxy Brown is a 1974 American blaxploitation action film written and directed by Jack Hill. It stars Pam Grier as the title character who takes on a gang of drug dealers who killed her boyfriend. The film was released by American International Pictures as a double feature with Truck Turner. The film uses Afrocentric references in clothing and hair. Grier starred in six blaxploitation films for American International Pictures.
Trouble Man is a 1972 American blaxploitation crime thriller film directed by Ivan Dixon and produced and released by 20th Century Fox. The film stars Robert Hooks as "Mr. T.", a hard-edged private detective who tends to take justice into his own hands. It is still of note today for its soundtrack, written, produced and performed by Marvin Gaye.
Coffy is a 1973 American blaxploitation action film written and directed by Jack Hill. The story is about a black female vigilante played by Pam Grier who seeks violent revenge against a heroin dealer responsible for her sister's addiction.
Thalmus Rasulala was an American actor with a long career in theater, television, and films. Noted for starring roles in blaxploitation films, he was also an original cast member of ABC's soap opera One Life to Live from its premiere in 1968 until he left the show in 1970.
The Payback is the 37th studio album by American musician James Brown. The album was released in December 1973, by Polydor Records. It was originally scheduled to become the soundtrack for the blaxploitation film Hell Up in Harlem, but was rejected by the film's producers, who dismissed it as "the same old James Brown stuff." A widely repeated story—including by Brown himself—that director Larry Cohen rejected the music as "not funky enough" is denied by Cohen. On the DVD commentary track for Black Caesar, Cohen states that executives at American International Pictures were already unhappy with Brown for delivering songs much longer than expected on Black Caesar and Slaughter's Big Rip-Off and opted for a deal with Motown Records instead. Cohen said the absence of Brown's music from Harlem still "breaks [his] heart."
Abraham Laboriel López is a Mexican-American bassist who has played on over 4,000 recordings and soundtracks. Guitar Player magazine called him "the most widely used session bassist of our time". Laboriel is the father of drummer Abe Laboriel Jr. and of producer, songwriter, and film composer Mateo Laboriel.
Pierre Lynn de Lappe, also known as Peter Brown, was an American actor. He portrayed Deputy Johnny McKay opposite John Russell as Marshal Dan Troop in the 1958 to 1962 ABC-Warner Brothers western television series Lawman and Texas Ranger Chad Cooper on NBC's Laredo from 1965 to 1967.
The outlaw biker film is a film genre that portrays its characters as motorcycle riding rebels. The characters are usually members of an outlaw motorcycle club.
Carolyn Ann Stewart, known professionally as Carol Speed, was an American actress, singer-songwriter and author. Speed was best known for her roles in films during the 1970s blaxploitation era, most notably starring as Abby Williams in the American International Pictures 1974 blaxploitation horror film Abby (1974).
Blaxploitation is an ethnic subgenre of the exploitation film that emerged in the United States during the early 1970s, when the combined momentum of the civil rights movement, the black power movement, and the Black Panthers spurred African-American artists to reclaim the power of depiction of their ethnicity, and institutions like UCLA to provide financial assistance for African-American students to study filmmaking. This combined with Hollywood adopting a less restrictive rating system in 1968. The term, a portmanteau of the words "black" and "exploitation", was coined in August 1972 by Junius Griffin, the president of the Beverly Hills–Hollywood NAACP branch. He claimed the genre was "proliferating offenses" to the black community in its perpetuation of stereotypes often involved in crime. After the race films of the 1940s and 1960s, the genre emerged as one of the first in which black characters and communities were protagonists, rather than sidekicks, supportive characters, or victims of brutality. The genre's inception coincides with the rethinking of race relations in the 1970s.
Hollywood Man is a 1976 American film directed by Jack Starrett. The film was featured in the 1997 Quentin Tarantino Film Festival.
Slaughter's Big Rip-Off is a 1973 blaxploitation film directed by Gordon Douglas and written by Charles Eric Johnson. The film stars Jim Brown, Ed McMahon, Don Stroud, Brock Peters, Gloria Hendry and Dick Anthony Williams. The film was released on August 31, 1973, by American International Pictures. It is the sequel to the 1972 film Slaughter.
"Sexy, Sexy, Sexy" is a 1973 song written and recorded by James Brown, for the film Slaughter's Big Rip-Off. The song appeared on the film's soundtrack, and was released as a single in 1973. The song, and wider album, emerged from an era which saw the rise of Blaxploitation films. Such films represented the struggle of African Americans against poverty and crime under a white-dominated society. While Sexy, Sexy, Sexy was received well by contemporary and modern audiences alike, it received negative reviews from critics. Brown used the same backing track and chord progression from his 1966 hit Money Won't Change You when composing the song, which prompted such a poor critical response. Despite Brown's Plagiarism of his earlier work, Sexy, Sexy, Sexy showcased the typical funk hallmarks of his more popular work. The song performed strongly on three separate Billboard charts as well as the Cashbox chart. It appeared in three separate releases under music label Polydor Records and reissued in 2020.
Night of the Strangler is a 1972 American blaxploitation mystery film directed by Joy N. Houck Jr. and starring Micky Dolenz and James Ralston. It depicts the story of Denise Roberts and her plans to enter into an interracial marriage with her baby's father; these plans are disrupted by his murder, which begins an escalating series of killings involving her brothers Vance (Dolenz) and Dan (Ralston) and their loved ones.
The Occupation of Catalina Island began on August 30, 1972, when the Brown Berets, a Chicano-rights organization, occupied Catalina Island, off the coast of Los Angeles, for three weeks. The Berets, led by their "Prime Minister" David Sanchez, claimed the territory rightfully belonged to Mexico and demanded that its 42,000 acres of undeveloped land be developed into housing.
