Black Gunn

Jim Brown deadpans his way through Black Action Film heaven. All the touchstones are here: The Mafia, a Black Panthers rip-off, drugs, trashy whores, nasty pimps, jittery dealers and even sweatier addicts, fist fights, gun play, drug dealers, revenge killings, psycho hit men, racial slurs, car chases, stolen cars, and explosions. Even more than that, plenty of early Seventies atmosphere here to enjoy: giant sedans, huge lapels, enormous hair, used car dealers, bowling, black revolutionaries, sexy stewardesses, and lots of fuzz guitar, tremolo and wah-wah pedals on all the music.

Jim Brown is a schmoove nightclub owner (this is an adult nightclub, kids, where the immaculately coiffed adults eat steak, drink whiskey and slow-dance to overproduced soul easy listening music) who's cooler than a cucumber popsicle. His uncool little brother is in with BAG, the Black Action Group, who get deep into it when they steal money and ledger books from THE MOB.

The greasy mobsters aren't gonna put up with that, so they put out the word: find those lousy #$$%*#* and kill 'em. But little brother hid the ledgers at Gunn's nightclub/suave bachelor pad. So they kill the brother anyway, and that REALLY makes Gunn mad. It's all-out war now, and Gunn has to avoid both the Fuzz and BAG on his one-man war of vengeance. There are some slow spots here and there, but the action sequences make up for the few slack bits. Brown is not going to be doing heavy drama anytime soon, but he does what he does here extremely well. Highly recommended for fans of Black Action Cinema.

Jim Brown once again shows us what screen presence is all about in this rather routine but enjoyable blaxploitation-action-melodrama. He plays the title character, who owns a club in L.A. One night, his younger brother Scott (Herbert Jefferson, Jr.), a member of a militant group, brings in the proceeds of a late night robbery, including some incriminating books; this brings down the wrath of the local mob. Before too long, Scott is dead and Gunn is therefore ripe for revenge.

The story is nothing special; it entertains solidly even if it's pretty predictable by and large. But director Robert Hartford-Davis (who went on to do "The Take" with Billy Dee Williams) handles a lot of this material with style. There's some eye candy on display (but no nudity), and the violence is potent all the way through the film. There's no shortage of slimy, reprehensible white villains to have fun booing; if nothing else, "Black Gunn" is enjoyable on a visceral level.

Brown is one cool customer, as so many of the best protagonists were in this sort of thing. You won't see him change his facial expression often, but you WILL see him take some lumps before this is over. However, as the primary nemesis, Martin Landau is almost thoroughly wasted, giving orders and throwing his weight around, but you never do see very much of the character.

Familiar faces scattered throughout the supporting cast also help to make it fun: Brenda Sykes (as Browns' gal pal), Luciana Paluzzi, Stephen McNally, Keefe Brasselle, Timothy Brown, William Campbell, Bernie Casey, Gary Conway, Tony Young, Jeannie Bell. The movie has a particularly strong role for Bruce Glover (of "Diamonds are Forever" fame) as a creepy white strong-arm man. He makes your skin crawl whenever he's on camera.

The dynamic cast and the equally dynamic soundtrack (composed by Tony Osborne) make this a most agreeable (if forgettable) way to kill an hour and 37 minutes.

Seven out of 10.

I have recently developed an appreciation for low budget British filmmaker Robert Hartford-Davis (1923-1977) after watching a handful of his horror films such as BLACK TORMENT (1965), CORRUPTION (1968), and THE FIEND aka BEWARE THE BRETHREN (1972). The constant thread running through these and such films as BLACK GUNN (1973) are imaginative camerawork, crisp but non-flashy editing, and consistently interesting performances from his actors.

In that sense Hartford-Davis is sort of a poor man's Michael Winner (literally since he never had the budgets Winner did for his films) which is meant as a compliment. I have a strong admiration for directors like Edgar G. Ulmer, Edward L. Cahn, and now Hartford-Davis who could create numerous memorable moments out of the small budgets that they had to work with. Small budgets also meant that they were stuck in genre films like horror or exploitation (Blaxploitation in this case) but even in this category the cream always manages to rise to the top.

Despite the title, BLACK GUNN is not a remake of the old TV series PETER GUNN refitted for an African-American audience. It's an urban crime melodrama set in L. A. with Jim Brown as the successful owner of a nightclub whose younger brother rips off the mob. We all know happens when you do that. Throw in some black militancy, some deliberately provocative racist dialogue, a delightfully droll performance by Martin Landau as the chief baddie, and B movie veterans Bruce Glover and William Campbell as a pair of deliriously sleazy hoods and you've got classic entertainment early 70s style (I'm sure Quentin Tarantino knows this particular movie).

It's all directed with a quiet panache by Hartford-Davis who had just come to America and would make one more feature before going into television and dying of a heart attack at 53. Is it a great movie? Of course not but within the limited parameters it has to contend with, BLACK GUNN is one of the best of the many Blaxploitation movies that were made at this time. I thoroughly enjoyed it and Robert Hartford-Davis is the reason why...For more reviews visit The Capsule Critic.

I'm not sure why the Mill Creek Entertainment company thought that this movie was deserving of a Blu-ray release. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy some elements of it. Since it's a blaxploitation movie from the 1970s, it has many of the fun trademarks of the genre, such as the clothing, hair styles, attitude, slimy bad guys, nudity, and so on. Also, the movie does boast some good action sequences here and there (love those splattery blood wounds!) Unfortunately, there are less action sequences than most viewers will be expecting and demanding. The movie instead is strung along with many long (and slow) sequences of talking, which often doesn't advance the plot that much. In fact, it takes almost half the movie before the character of Gunn is enraged and decides to take revenge. And even when the character of Gunn is engaged on the path of revenge, the performance by Jim Brown more often than not makes the character seem disinterested and bored. The movie also ends on a note with several plot threads clearly not given a proper conclusion. There are definitely worse blaxploitation movies than "Black Gunn", but there are definitely some that are much better. I'd only recommend it to fans of the genre who have already seen the better efforts and are really craving for more, and who are willing to put up with the aforementioned defects the movie has.

Just watched this Jim Brown action movie on the Crackle site. He plays Gunn, a nightclub owner who vows vengeance after his brother-because of his involvement in a robbery-gets killed. Unlike most blaxploitation movies, this one takes it's time in developing the story though it threatens to get monotonous when sequences get too talky. Of the supporting cast, the most interesting player to me was Jim Watkins playing the only black officer-in this case, Lt. Ken Hopper-who is firm but fair in his dealings with Gunn. My favorite scene was the one where a couple of white women staying at his girlfriend's house start putting the moves on him before that girlfriend shoos them away but not before Gunn's shirt came off! Ooh, yeah! So on that note, Black Gunn is highly recommended.