Monday, July 30, 2007

Darius James (a.k.a. Dr. Snakeskin): That’s Blaxploitation! Roots of the Baadasssss ‘Tude (Rated X by an All-Whyte Jury) (St. Martin’s, 1995) I found this book just this week, though it has been out for more than ten years. It is a perfect compliment to Todd Boyd's Super Fly 70’s, but Blaxploitation goes into much more detail about some of the issues touched upon in the more recent book. It does so with loads of attitude, not to mention some pretty sick and side-busting humor, exemplified by the twisted flip-book that dances at the bottom right corner of most recto pages. Regardless of how much fun this book is to read, Darius James knows his stuff when it comes to 70’s Black cinema. This is the best single source of printed information on this neglected movie genre I have found.