Cleopatra Jones

Back in the Seventies, mainstream audiences still reeling from the one-two punch of Shaft and Superfly were subjected to a barrage of ghetto avengers - Black Caesar, Willie Dynamite, The Candy Tangerine Man and the rest - all covering depressingly familiar terrain. Black writer Max Julien (also an actor, playing the lead role in the pimpsploitation classic The Mack) offered AiP his script for a female alternative but passed. Warner was quick to snatch up the rights, and in 1973 foisted the first black superchick onto the American public: Cleopatra Jones.

The film opens with a blazing opium field somewhere in Turkey. Cleo Jones, hap-ki-do expert and international do-gooder, returns to America to report on her success as a 'special agent' in her one-woman war on dope. Lesbian drug baroness Mommy (Shelley Winters, fresh from Corman's Bloody Mama) is furious her poppy fields were torched, and threatens an all-out war between the Brothers and the Mothers. One of Mommy's uppity underlings, Doodlebug (Antonio Fargas, best remembered as Huggy Bear in Starsky And Hutch) is getting rich off stealing Mommy's coke, and provides a cautionary moral aside warning against living as a White Man's flunky (Cleo points to Doodlebug's white chauffeur, and asks "What next - two white jockeys on the lawn?"). With a "whacka-whacka" superfunk guitar in the background, Cleo does her chop-sockey routine on the coke dealers and crooked cops, and kicks Shelley Winters' portly ass for her wild overacting in the final showdown. Tamara Dobson as Cleo Jones reportedly stood 6"2, and that doesn't include what must've been the BIGGEST afro in the business! Despite her physical prowess, the script doesn't give Cleo any real motive for her cartoon crusade (unlike the later Coffy and Foxy Brown) and reduces her to a smug self-satisfied cardboard cutout. Add the sloppy direction by Jack Starrett and you get a surprisingly poor release by a major studio.

One thing's for sure - Tamara Dobson is very very cool in the title role of Cleopatra Jones, the sexy heroine of this satirical blaxploitation flick. That being said, Cleopatra, a Special Agent who fights drug lords and other bad guys in a fire-spitting black corvette, is the only true reason to watch "Cleopatra Jones" of 1973. Apart from the cool heroine the film has not very much to offer, as it is simply not as explicit and exploitation-style as most blaxploitation-highlights of the time, such as "Coffy" and "Foxy Brown" starring the incomparable Pam Grier, for example. Sure, the film has a cool heroine, funky music, action and lots of funny moments, but when I am about to watch a film often labeled as a blaxploitation classic I expect a little more. Namely - a little more violence and sleaze.

Take "Coffy", for example - one of the greatest blaxploitation movies ever made, one of the coolest heroines ever, played by the great Pam Grier, loads of sleaze, brutal violence, and one out of two words is the F-Word. The main weakness of "Cleopatra Jones" is that it is an blaxploitation movie without most of the elements that make exploitation interesting, probably because it was intended for wider audiences. OK, there is some mild violence and some mildly crude language occasionally, but explicit violence, as well as nudity, sex and F-Words were avoided. Not that I need these elements in any movie I see, but for blaxploitation flicks from the 70s they're mandatory, in my opinion.

The film is very satirical, however, the villains are simply ridiculous (and most of them quite annoying). Funnily the main villain, a very annoying, but also somehow funny white drug-queen called "Mommy" is played by the great Shelley Winters. Blaxploitation regular Antonio Fargas and Bernie Casey, as well as some others also fit in their roles quite well. The main reason, to watch "Cleoatra Jones" is Tamara Dobson however. Dobson is certainly not nearly as unforgettable as the great Pam Grier in her many blaxploitation roles, but she still makes a great, sexy and super-cool blaxploitation heroine, and that alone makes the movie worth the time! The film is overall pretty funny, and a highly entertaining time-waster. If you're looking for truly great blaxploitation cinema, however, go for films like "Coffy" or "Foxy Brown".

Tamara Dobson plays the title character, the best dressed United States Agent in the history of cinema. She's on a quest for justice and for burning down poppy fields.

Her rival is Mommy, played by Shelley Winters, who gives a subtle, restrained perf...naw, I'm fooling ya, she's re-defining over-the-top as she GNAWS on every single piece of scenery, all in a variety of Eva Gabor wigs. Seeing her rub the bottom of her young girlfriend, and then get her feet rubbed by the same girl...I wasn't sure if I was going to vomit or thank the movie gods that created this.

Plot is virtually unimportant as Cleo battles the fuzz, Antonio Fargas and anyone who gets in her way. Movie is vintage fun and it was nice to see Esther Rolle in a small part. 6/10.

Needless to say, my favourite Quentin Tarantino film is 'Jackie Brown'. I enjoyed the action, and Tamara Dobson was gorgeous (I can't believe she was 6'2"! Wow!). I wish she had done more movies, and hadn't died so young (at age 59, of pneumonia and multiple sclerosis). Though director Starrett (who died even younger, of kidney failure) mainly did TV work, I loved his 'Race with the Devil', which was from around this time. He was very good at these kind of films, at both presenting action set-pieces and building suspense.

I would like to see ALL of these 'urban action' films. Though from my movie-watching experience, I find that I tend to prefer films from before 1970, these films from the 70's are great too, and are a lot more enjoyable to me than most films I see today.

I sincerely hope that, like in 'Cleopatra Jones', the filmmakers of today could concentrate on actors' presence and stunts, rather than simply go with CGI. I for one would be a lot happier as a cinephile.

Cleopatra Jones was an inspired effort, given the period it was made. As a black male, I really appreciate the film. The character is one of liberation, and contrary to what has been said about the film, her job is to get rid of drugs, and keep America safe, black or white!!! And yes, you can do good in the hood and look good as well! She is clearly not meant to be anti-establishment, and the story goes a long way in that regard. It is too bad that characters such as Cleopatra Jones, Foxy Brown, and Coffy do not get the credit they deserve. You wouldn't find too many strong heroines beside Wonder Woman, until Ellen Ripley comes along in Alien.