Those 70’s films starring some of the grooviest Black actors and actresses of the times were outta sight! The films were not quite a fad or a movement but they were an immensely popular and profitable genre that was criticized by some and celebrated by others in the Black community. We nostalgically remember these movies that are still near and dear to our hearts.
The scores from many of the films became phenomenal hits like Shaft, Superfly, Across 110th Street, and Trouble Man. A few Black leading men made women swoon like Ron O’Neal, Max Julien, Fred Williamson and Billy Dee Williams. While Black leading ladies like Pam Grier, Vonetta McGee and Tamara Dobson made men pant. All of these Blaxploitation era cinematic ingredients gave Black audiences something that Hollywood had failed miserably at doing before and that is, a chance to see ourselves on the big screen fighting back, loving and leading!
Do you consider yourself to be a Blaxploitation film expert? If so, take the quiz and check out your knowledge, jive turkey!
- Pam Grier did not appear in which film?
a) Coffy
b) Foxy Brown
c) Sheba Baby
d) Cleopatra Jones
2. Issac Hayes starred in which film?
a) Shaft
b) Black Belt Jones
c) Black Caesar
d) Truck Turner
3. Melvin Van Peebles produced, directed, wrote, scored and starred in this X-rated box office hit.
a) Willie Dynamite
b) Cotton Comes to Harlem
c) Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song
d) The Mack
4. Tamara Dobson, the statuesque 6’2” former model and karate expert played the lead in which film?
a) Friday Foster
b) Black Mama, White Mama
c) Cleopatra Jones
d) Trick Baby
5. Which film was a semi-biographical account of the CIA’s first Black agent?
a) The Spook Who Sat By the Door
b) Three the Hard Way
c) Black Samson
d) Uptown Saturday Night
6. The Shaft soundtrack featured songs from which vocalist who went on to voice Chef on South Park?
a) Issac Hayes
b) Al Green
c) Curtis Mayfield
d) Stevie Wonder
7. Which inimitable actor starred in Dolemite and its sequel?
a) Melvin Van Peebles
b) Yaphett Cotto
c) Richard Roundtree
d) Rudy Ray Moore
8. Super Fly is one of the few films in history that was outgrossed by its soundtrack. Who wrote and produced the soundtrack?
a) James Brown
b) Quincy Jones
c) Curtis Mayfield
d) Billy Preston
9. In 1972, Blaxploitation notoriously remade a horror classic. What was the title?
a) Frankenstein
b) Blacula
c) Sugar Hill
d) An American Werewolf in Harlem
10. Approximately how many Blaxploitation pictures were produced between 1971 to 1976?
a) 25
b) 50
c) 100
d) 200
Answer key: 1) d, 2) d, 3) c, 4) c, 5) a, 6) a, 7) d, 8) c, 9) b, 10) d