Dolemite Films
Dolemite (1975) – 6.0
It's been a long time coming Lord but I finally saw Dolemite. Cussingest
big dick bad man around. Lady killer, hat wearer, soul stirrer. For years
of course I have known about Dolemite - all the cool white kids had seen Dolemite
- but I am as far from cool and as you can get and the it's so bad it's good
patter never caught my fancy. Why do people go out of their way to watch
bad films - known medically as the Edward D Woods Dementia Syndrome. But
after seeing Dolemite is My Name with Eddie Murphy I had to see the original
and now I am a cool hip white kid too - about 45 years too late. This is actually
better than the Murphy film had led me to expect - the acting is pretty bad
and the action scenes are sort of lame and the plot has a certain let's say
lack of clarity or logic - but it is reasonably well-edited, nice sets, well-photographed
(by of all people the son of Josef von Sternberg) and full of just crazy
ass scenes that delight. And it is Rudy Ray Moore in the flesh.
After reading a bit about Rudy, it sounds like his bio-pic kept it close
to reality. He grew up poor, tried his hand at lots of things and failed,
found himself at nearly 50 years old working in a record store with his life
seeming already written out and then came upon an idea of a comedy style.
This was telling stories in rhyme with music and a beat - poetry of the streets,
of the ghetto laced with profanity, filth and sex. And it worked (there are
two bits in the film). His comedy act found a black urban audience and he
began putting out albums. Later some called him the Godfather of Rap and Snoop
Dog's appearance in the Murphy film is a salute to him from one rapper to
another.
But shit that wasn't enough - he wanted to make a movie - it was the age
of the Black Exploitation movies and he figured he could make one too. Why
not. Just because he had a sagging gut like a pregnant dog's and no experience?
So what. No one thought he could make a record. It turns into a Let's Put
on a Show - a real live one without Mickey Rooney or Judy Garland - he gets
all his friends involved, gets some kids from the UCLA film program to shoot
it and light it, girls from the strip clubs to bare their body, talks a serious
community theater writer into writing the script - telling him what we want
is lots of pimps, prostitutes, crooked cops, sex, naked breasts, kung fu and
clearly lots of hats - Joan Crawford would be envious. And he actually convinces
a known actor - not well known mind you but the black audience knew him -
to act in it and direct it. And with all of his money on the line he made
a film. It is an amazing story of resilience. Not to be corny but it is a
quintessential American story. And I was really happy to read that the real
Rudy Ray Moore was as nice as Murphy plays him - a gentle sweet man behind
the act.
I am glad I saw the Murphy film first - it gives this a context that makes
it a great tale - not the film itself - it really isn't very good - but just
how it arrived on the Silver Screen. You just come in with a lot of affection
for the film and a willingness to overlook a few things. One thing I don't
get are two differences between this film and the re-creation of it done with
Murphy. There are a couple scenes in the Murphy film that were not in my
version of Dolemite. The wild sex scene is not here though they show a clip
of the real scene if I recollect in the end credits of Murphy's film and
when he pulls out the intestines of the bad guy it is missing in Dolemite.
So perhaps I had an edited version? I also want to give a short nod to the
Chuck Norris Karate School that is credited! Chuck must have been proud!
The Human Tornado (1976) – 3.0
Rudy Ray Moore followed up the unexpected success of Dolemite with this
film in which Dolemite is back. It answered a question I had about the first
film - why were there scenes in the Eddy Murphy film My Name is Dolemite
that seemingly recreates the Dolemite film but they weren't in Dolemite.
That is because they are in this film. Nothing wrong with that. The intent
was pure.
Perhaps the affection I had for Rudy engendered by Dolemite is My Name had
worn off by the following day, but I thought this was terrible. Though I have
seen others who prefer this one to Dolemite. There is about 60 minutes that
go by in which nothing happens - other than Dolemite doing an insult routine
at a comedy club, a long drive across country, a whole bunch of glimpses of
musical acts and lots of naked breasts - very large naked breasts - I thought
I might have stumbled into a Russ Meyer film. Really, nothing happens. Certainly
not good acting or coherence. When Subway Cinema put on Hong Kong festivals
of kung fu and horror, the rule we had was that something had to happen every
ten minutes or so - the 10-minute rule of keeping the audience from falling
asleep or walking out - though hopefully not at the same time. It didn't
have to be a lot - a fight, a flying head, a demon sacrificing a virgin -
but something to get the audience yelling at the screen instead of at us.
If I had been in the audience in 1976, I would have been yelling what is
this shit. Unless you like large naked breasts I guess - there were those.
Dolemite is for some reason living in a mansion in redneckville where they
have to hide the daughters at night - from their brothers - and when the sheriff
learns that there are the N-word - living up on the hill he calls all his
men together to break up a party and finds his wife enjoying the pleasures
of Dolemite - so he kills his wife and Dolemite and his men (one being a
very young Ernie Hudson right at the beginning of his career) go on the run
and hijack a car in which the driver is very gay and coy and well you can
imagine how that was portrayed. Once in LA they find out that Queen Bee from
the first film is having trouble with a nightclub competitor and she needs
help. Dolemite is ready and willing.
In the final 20 minutes the film finally wakes up with a woman tied up with
a hand grenade between her legs balancing on a rolling pin, another one has
a bed of nails above her and a burning rope, a big old fight breaks out between
everyone and Rudy Ray Moore seems to think he has learned martial arts since
the last film as he gives everyone a beating that is sped up like a cartoon
figure on cocaine - I am not sure if this was intended to be funny or he just
thought no one would notice. In any event, I was not impressed - even by
the large breasts - Rudy you had to have something happen between the 10
minute mark and the 70 minute mark - anything - this is Trash Cinema - give
us some trash. I think my exploration of the films of Rudy Ray Moore will
be put into abeyance for a while. Moore was only to make four more films in
the 1970's and 80's before he started appearing in a few films again.
Disco Godfather
(1979) - 6.0
I don't care what name the movie gives Rudy Ray Moore, he is Dolemite to
me. Dolemite cool as he grooves his way through the crowded dance floor in
his blue denim pant suit with just the right number of buttons undone exposing
his Dolemite manliness. The crowd parts like Moses and the Red Sea as he
glistens, smiles and moves forward with each hip thrust and head shake. He
runs this dance palace where soul brothers and sisters come to put aside
their worries and soak up the energy of hot disco dancing and having fun.
With more delicious 1970's disco regalia, leotards, tight shorts and glitter
than the Village Halloween Parade. Cover charge $3. Then Evil Mr. Angel Dust
intrudes as it takes his nephew Bucky away into freaky psychotic hallucinations
of skeletons, demons and a samurai cutting off his arm. Bucky is sent away
to a clinic where they allow all the Angel Dust patients to mingle together
in their own Private Idaho - one whipping another. Therapy I guess.
Rudy goes to the cops - now dressed in a snazzy white suit - and tells
them he is going to get to the bottom of this Angel Dust. He is an ex-cop
and the Lieutenant says after he leaves - there are only three things that
get him mad - when they mess with his family - we never learn what the other
two are - probably poor etiquette at the dinner table and making fun of his
clothing style - but there is going to be hell to pay he says! And
then we are back to the disco floor. Ah-huh, ah-huh. Yup, what we got here
is your typical Anti-drug-disco-gangsta film. And a fashion show plate as
Rudy goes through more outfits than a Bollywood Queen.
In his fine apparel Rudy goes around town beating up on every low life he
sees, breaking into cocaine parties with out of town riffraff and slinky
women who all dive for the floor when the cocaine gets knocked over and then
even upsetting bridge games. The final fifteen minutes or so is pure fantasmagorica
fabulous as Rudy goes to the bad guy's warehouse and takes on about 20 punks
with some of the lamest kung fu seen outside of a nunnery. Then he gets a
dose of Angel Dust and sees the demons and his mother in an incredibly well
edited piece of insanity that goes back and forth between his demons and
a young woman at the hospital who is surrounded by holy rollers trying to
exorcise hers. It is pretty great. Not the movie which is really low budget
with generally terrible acting from amateurs and a script that had to be
written on the run - but on another level it is just so much silly fun to
watch partly because of its faults and the disco scenes but also because
you know they are taking the film so seriously.
Dolemite is My Name (2019) - 8.0
Hello Mother Fuckers. This film got no Oscar nominations? Mother Fuckers.
Someone needs to beat those voters over the head with a sense of humor. Every
pleasure receptacle in my body was feeding off of this film like needy hungry
parasites. It is so good natured and sweet yet with more expletives than Tarantino
can use in a lifetime. This should be shown in high schools to kids who think
the system is against them and they have nowhere to go. Ya, the system does
want to keep you down, fuck you up but follow the Dolemite lessons of life.
Say fuck you to anything and anyone who tells you that you can't and keep
on trying. Sometimes good things happen. Eddie Murphy is amazing in this
bio-pic capturing the essence of a good man with humor and humanity. He just
breathes in this performance like it is as natural as putting on your shoes.
Now I have to go watch the original - something I have avoided all my life!
Dolemite!
