: Baadasssss!
This is a movie about a movie: Mario Van Peebles wrote, directed, and stars in this pseudo documentary about his father Melvin’s controversial 1971 movie, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadassssss Song, which was not only one of the first films directed by a black man, but one of the first successful independent films. This movie shows the long, hard road he had to haul to get there: trying to get white people to finance a film they couldn’t understand about a revolutionary topic (a black guy beats up corrupt white policemen and goes on the lam), hiring staff from the porn business so he could avoid the unions, using his own money, borrowing and begging and stealing, etc. It’s a terrific look at that era, at independent movie-making, and it’s also a character study of Mario and his relationship with his dad (who is portrayed with many flaws as he was so driven to do the film he hurt many people in the process). Apparently the original film isn’t the greatest movie, but it had a huge impact on the movie industry and started trends in films that still exist today. This movie also isn’t the greatest — it focuses a bit too much on the lurid details at times and possibly overcelebrates Melvin’s “greatest” as a director — but it is extremely interesting, especially if you’re curious about the movie industry or racial relations in the 1970s.
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