Brotherhood of Death is a low-budget 1976 action film in the blaxploitation genre, directed by Richard F. Barker and Bill Berry, and starring Roy Jefferson, Le Tari, and Haskell Anderson. The film featured appearances by several members, including Jefferson, of the Washington Redskins professional football team of the National Football League.
Frederick Robert Williamson, also known as "the Hammer", is an American actor and former professional football defensive back who played mainly in the American Football League (AFL) during the 1960s. Williamson has had a busy film career, starring as Tommy Gibbs in the 1973 crime drama film Black Caesar and its sequel Hell Up in Harlem. Williamson also had roles in other 1970s blaxploitation films such as Hammer (1972), That Man Bolt (1973) and Three the Hard Way (1974).
Black Caesar is a 1973 American blaxploitation crime drama film written and directed by Larry Cohen and starring Fred Williamson, Gloria Hendry and Julius Harris. It features a musical score by James Brown, his first experience with writing music for film. A sequel titled Hell Up in Harlem was released in late 1973.
D'Urville Martin was an American actor in both film and television. He appeared in numerous 1970s movies in the blaxploitation genre. He also appeared in two unaired pilots of what would become All in the Family as Lionel Jefferson. Born in New York City, Martin began his career in the mid-1960s and soon appeared in prominent films such as Black Like Me, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, and Rosemary's Baby. Martin also directed films in his career, including Dolemite, starring Rudy Ray Moore.
Boss Nigger is a 1975 blaxploitation Western film directed by Jack Arnold, starring former football player Fred Williamson, who also wrote and co-produced the film. It is the first film for which Williamson was credited as screenwriter or producer.
Black Shampoo is an American exploitation film directed by Greydon Clark. Released in 1976, the comedy film is considered an example of the blaxploitation and sexploitation subgenres of exploitation film. Produced on a budget of $50,000, the film stars John Daniels as Jonathan Knight, an African American businessman and hairdresser who frequently has sex with his predominantly white female clients, and Tanya Boyd as Brenda, Jonathan's secretary and girlfriend, who was previously in a relationship with a white mob boss, who, out of jealousy towards his ex's new lover, begins to regularly send goons to trash Jonathan's hair salon. The violence escalates as the film progresses.
Hammer is a 1972 blaxploitation film directed by Bruce D. Clark. The film was released following the successes of Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song and Shaft, notable 1971 films that popularized black cinema. It starred Fred Williamson as B.J. Hammer. Williamson went on to become a staple of the genre.
The Soul of Nigger Charley is a 1973 American blaxploitation Western film directed by Larry Spangler and starring Fred Williamson. It is the sequel to 1972's The Legend of Nigger Charley. It is followed by Boss Nigger. It is rated R in the United States.
Don Pedro Colley was an American actor. Some of his better known roles include Gideon on Daniel Boone, Ongaro in Beneath the Planet of the Apes, SRT in George Lucas' THX 1138, Joshua in The Legend of Nigger Charley, and Sheriff Ed Little in the 1980s TV series The Dukes of Hazzard.
Robert Lee Minor is an American stunt performer, television and film actor, best known for doubling many African-American celebrities such as: Jim Brown, Fred Williamson, Bernie Mac, Danny Glover, Carl Weathers, Roger E. Mosley and John Amos. Minor was born in Birmingham, Alabama, and made his first television appearance in 1973 on the television program, Search, then appeared in tons of shows such as: McCloud, Barnaby Jones, The Six Million Dollar Man, Wonder Woman, Eight Is Enough, Magnum, P.I. and Starsky & Hutch among other popular television programs.
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.
Black Eye is a 1974 American neo-noir action and blaxploitation film produced by Pat Rooney, directed by Jack Arnold and starring Fred Williamson. The film was based on the 1971 novel Murder on the Wild Side by Jeff Jacks.
Joshua is a 1976 American Western film directed by Larry G. Spangler.
That Man Bolt is a 1973 American action film directed by David Lowell Rich and Henry Levin. It stars Fred Williamson in the title role of a courier and Byron Webster. The film combined several genres: blaxploitation, the martial arts film, and James Bond superspy films. It was filmed in Hong Kong, Macau and the United States and featured several martial arts experts in action: Mike Stone, World Professional Light Heavyweight Karate Champion, Kenji Kazama Japan Kickboxing Champion, Emil Farkas, European Black Belt Karate Champion, and David Chow, Former California State Judo Champion. It was titled Operation Hong Kong outside the United States. Peter Crowcroft wrote the novelization of the screenplay.
Blaxploitation horror films are a genre of horror films involving mostly black actors. In 1972, William Crain directed what is considered to be the first blaxploitation horror film, Blacula.
No Way Back is a 1976 blaxploitation film written and directed by Fred Williamson, who also stars as Jesse Crowder, a private detective who once used to belong to a police force, but that now finds himself taking odd jobs for a little extra money.
Bucktown, USA is a 1975 American crime action blaxploitation film released by American International Pictures starring Fred Williamson.
Leon Isaac Kennedy is a retired American actor, disc jockey, film producer and playwright. Kennedy's acting roles include Martel "Too Sweet" Gordone in Jamaa Fanaka's Penitentiary (1979), Penitentiary II (1982), Lone Wolf McQuade (1983) and Penitentiary III (1987), and Leon "The Lover" Johnson in the 1981 film Body and Soul alongside his then-wife Jayne Kennedy.
William Wellman Jr. is an American former actor. In a career spanning 65 years, he appeared in about 77 films and television series.
