Christipher (yes, it is spelled that way) Joy stars as Eddie "Big Time" Jones, a small time conman who is running insurance scams to get by. He accidentally (haha) hits the big score when he robs some mob guys and they have $100,000 in a briefcase. The film was just so-so, but is interesting in that it was produced and co-written by Smokey Robinson (who contributed several songs) and Leon Isaac Kennedy (whose wife Jayne is also the female lead). Robinson spoke to papers at the time of its limited release and emphasized how he wanted to make more family oriented black films that eschewed the violence of the blaxploitation films of that era. He achieved his goal, but it is also probably why the film didn't do well as it is pretty innocuous stuff. Example of their kind of joke: A recurring visual gag every time a mob guy is onscreen is to have a really big pizza nearby. It is the only film Robinson produced. Cheech & Chong fans should recognize Joy as Curtis from Up In Smoke (1978). He is funny but you could imagine someone like Richard Pryor doing a lot better with the material. The real reason to see it are two great supporting performances: Roger Moseley as loan shark/pimp J. J. and Art Evans as a private eye who insists on always talking like Bogart.
