Coffy

The so-called "Blaxploitation" films of the early 1970s—mostly low-budget action films featuring African-American performers Hollywood would not cast in mainstream movies—were often criticized for glorifying gangsters, drug dealers, and pimps. Coffy, with Pam Grier in a star-making role, is set in the same urban culture but features a strong, resolute female hero. Coffy is an emergency room nurse by day and vigilante by night, targeting the dealers who turned her sister into a comatose junkie. She works her way up to the Italian mobsters who are muscling into the ghetto drug trade, while also being romanced by a smooth-talking politician and a nice guy cop whose refusal to sell out to the corrupt force earns him a crippling beating. Coffy serves up plenty of sex, a catty girl-fight that leaves the losers topless, and car chases and shootouts, but what makes the film a Blaxploitation classic is Grier's Amazon presence and fiery charisma, together with director Jack Hill's gritty action scenes, which are marked by visceral violence (Coffy blasting the skull of a sleazy drug pusher into pulp, a mob thug—played by cult actor Sid Haig—dragging a victim behind a speeding car in a sadistic lynching, and Coffy taking out a gunman with a shotgun to the groin). Grier and Hill teamed up for the pseudo-sequel Foxy Brown, which is even more famous. Hardly a work of art, but a notable genre film, this is a strong optional purchase. (S. Axmaker)