The Black 6

I'm so glad this was brought to my attention. While watching a documentary about the Minnesota Vikings, I learned about the interesting life of Carl Eller, and this movie came up. Needless to say, I had to watch it. From a genre viewpoint, it was a pretty standard Blaxploitation movie, but dang was it kinda funny.

The story is basically the saga of a peace loving biker club, who all happen to be comprised of some of the best football players in the NFL during this era of the early 70s. It was a nice time capsule so to speak, as there was strife in the NFL during this time and the players felt they were not being properly compensated. Only the best could live off the earnings of their NFL paychecks in those days, for many of those men had to get second jobs during the offseason. It only made sense to bring in some well built, hungry football players to portray a tough motorcycle club that was seeking answers for a mysterious death. The fact they got Mercury Morris, Willie Lanier, Eller, Gene Washington, Lem Barney and Mean Joe Green is quite amazing, considering the profile these players had during their time.

All of the tropes are there. Black man gets killed for dating a white woman, the brother of the man searches for answers in a nearly all white town, no one talks, some casual racism is spouted out, good guys battle racism, etc. There is nothing different about this film than from any others beyond the fact the good guys hilariously destroy a racist cafe owner's establishment. Trust me, that scene is gold.

My main critique is the end. Boy oh boy what the heck happened. It's clear they ran out of money, because even though it looked like our boys were going to get burnt and killed by the racist motorcycle gang, the movie just stops and basically tells us they won. How? Anyway, weird ending aside, it's a fun movie and worth checking out.

The Black 6 (1973)

** (out of 4)

Blaxploitation flick about a black kid who is killed by a white motorcycle gang after they catch him with a white woman. Soon after his brother Bubba (Gene Washington) shows up with his five friends to get to the bottom of the crime and soon realize that they're going to have to take down quite a few honky's. THE BLACK 6 isn't a classic movie in the same field as THE DEFIANT ONES but who in their right mind is going to come into this thing expecting greatness? If you're looking for an ultra-cheap, silly and poorly made film that at least keeps you entertained then this here offers that. Again, there's no question that the film doesn't offer up anything of real quality but if that's what you're expecting then it's best to just stay away to begin with. The film's big point to get people to watch it is that the six black guys are all played by NFL players with the two biggest names being Joe Greene and Mercury Morris who most people will know from being on ESPN each year whenever the last undefeated team finally loses a game and protects his Dolphins only perfect season. None of the six NFL players can act but this really doesn't take anything away from the picture. The other motorcycle gang really can't act either so I guess you could say that everyone is on a level playing field. I really thought the story here was pretty predictable and it's certainly nothing we haven't seen before yet it kept me interested in the characters and there's no doubt that the six bikers were fun to watch. There's a very funny sequence towards the start of the picture where the six black guys are taking care of an elderly white woman, which I'm sure was meant to show that they didn't hate white people, just the ones that harmed them. This is followed up by another funny scene where a racist couple refuses to serve them so they literally tear down the building. THE BLACK 6 isn't as bad as its reputation as long as you go into it not expecting it to be something it's not.

The Black Six isn't the greatest movie around but what do you rate it against ? There aren't that many black biker movies around. The Black angels would be slightly better and movies like JC and the one with Motown singer Marvin Gaye only featured black actors. As a Black Biker movie in the genre its pretty good , and as a movie its good enough ! Actually its quite enjoyable most of the time and the action at the end makes it more or less well worth it and a great climax. The soundtrack is good funky stuff and the title song is absolutely amazing ! I don't know if the song "The Black Six" was ever released on 45 but the stylus would have a pretty hard job of staying in the groove as it would be dancing all over the place.

The movie is basically about a white girl and a black guy who fall in love. The white girls brother is in a motor bike gang and is a racist and he and his buddies kill the black guy. The Black six are six decent but no nonsense black ex army buddies who ride together . Also the guy who was killed by the racist bikers is the brother of one of the six. So its the revenge thing here with some adventure on the way. And an amazing climax and the end of the movie. Great action !

BUT for that very reason, i highly recommend it to anyone who is sick of quality. oh sure, film can attain the poetic. yeah yeah. but then a movie like this will be made, humbling all high-flown notions about the heights film can attain. all-around horrifically bad acting (note the "cracker" jogging for his life from flora's diner), crappy background music (someone wake up the trumpeter and tell him to read the sheet music, huh?), poor film stock (but alas, it looks like the DVD releasing company color-corrected the 70s pink out of it), corny framing (note the waving American flag as Bubba gives his heartfelt soliloquy on the steps of the trailer post office.) it's high camp for those starved for poor taste. like me.

i'm giving it a '1' because it deserves it and connoisseurs of the bad would do likewise. but we LOVE crap like this, so a '1' in our books means #1!!! even though it really is awful and you'd be a sucker to watch it. but a lucky sucker indeed.

The black six is a standard blacksploitation movie enhanced by the cast of all star football players. The black six mentioned in the title are a rough gang of bikers just back from vietnam looking for nothing but a good time and brotherly love. Yet, they are met with strife and problems. It seems that everywhere they go they are judged because of the color of their skin. The leader of the groups brother is killed and they have finally had enough of the oppression so they finally fight back. The black six are succesful in defeating their foes and the oppression ends. Mysteriously, the movie ends with them fighting and the screen sends an ominous message out to all of those that are thinking about bullying around others in the future "look out honky, hassle a brother and the black six will return."