Melinda

This is one in a long line of blaxploitation films made during the 70's that were designed as money making vehicles. Most of them are simply terrible, but Melinda is actually a cool one.

Its basically a revenge tale, but it is chock full of melodrama and excitement. The story is an overdone one, but the films' cheapness actually benefits it. The settings seem authentic and the movie actually manages to capture some street life in it.

Admittedly, the acting is not excellent, but somehow the film manages to be entertaining in a "ghetto" way. Don't go out of your way to see it, though.

In L. A., radio DJ Frankie J. Parker (Calvin Lockhart) learns karate from his friend Charles Atkins. He meets and has a fling with Melinda. When she's murdered, he's the prime suspect.

I don't like Frankie and it takes too long to get to the murder. It's also a missed opportunity to show the murder. It has many of the blaxploitation styles but to me, it's not strictly blaxploitation. It's just a murder conspiracy mystery. This is probably more notable for introducing black karate champion Jim Kelly. It's a year before his role in Enter the Dragon. There is opportunity to get bloodier into gory violence. It has some action. The fight action is fine although it could be staged better. I would like this much more if I actually like Frankie.

I thought when you went to the drive-in to watch bl2cksploitation movies it was for cheap thrills.

Where's the entertainment here? The lead actor isn't suave or cool. He's just some vain, obnoxious jagov. The first 40 minutes are consumed with this guy meeting a fine lady, making out, and then finding her dead in his apartment. This should have taken less than 10 minutes.

The rest is hardly any better. Something about the mob. Some karate. And a lot of really terrible acting. The fight scenes, in particular, are laughably bad.

It's all so boring.

That super-ego brilliant Mutha Frankie J. Parker played by Calvin Lockhart is a ghetto disc jockey who smooth talks and womanizes until he meets a sultry gal named Melinda played by Vonetta McGee. Things go smoothly until Melinda winds up dead in Frankie's apartment. The mob is behind the hit since Melinda had one of their audio tapes concealed in a cigarette box. Frankie cant take on the mob all by himself so he rounds up a few buddies and struggling businessman and karate instructor Charlie Atkins played by Jim Kelly and together form a small army and go into combat. Kelly, who is responsible for the violence and Lockhart take on thugs, steal their cars and drive up to the mob boss's mob to "clear things up" and "close the deal". In the end Frankie rekindles a lost love interest and Kelly and his crew go back to the real world and leave Frankie and his old time gal to reconcile and understand each other throughout the end of the film. Through this violent action film I saw a lot of the characters emotions, the fear,the struggle,the anger,the courage, and the love and romance. At the end I felt good inside. I could Identify with the characters who went through all that. To me this film has been overlooked and underrated. "Melinda" should be digitally remastered and recorded on DVD. I strongly recommend this film to anyone. Look past the color and the genre. This is your kind of Black Film.

A smooth DJ falls for a woman he's just met. When he finds her dead a short time later, he discovers that she had been killed because of her ties to organized crime. The DJ decides to avenge her death, receiving the help of a woman (the late, great Rosalind Cash) whom he had scorned. This film doesn't exactly follow the bullets and blood formula of many other Blackploitation action films. It does a little better on characterization, especially of the DJ and his scorned gal pal. However, it doesn't get as deep as it promises to be.