Director: Christopher Leitch Year:
1978 Rating: 5.0
You know right off that Otis is cool. For one
thing as the film begins, he is walking in the middle of the country road
- something black guys probably didn't often do in the south in 1979 - but
mainly because Otis is played by Super Fly, Ron O'Neal. For whatever reason,
O'Neal hadn't done much since his Super Fly days in two films five years
previously. He isn't that cool here, but he is still a tough bastard as he
goes through women and fighters with style. There are a few good action scenes
here but director Christopher Leitch stuffs the film with way too much dead
time in which nothing of note happens. He sends it off though very nicely
with a litter of dead bodies.
Otis comes into a new town without much
more than a pool stick and attitude that he hopes to make his fortune with.
But the pool hall is run by Louisiana Slim (Bill Cobbs) and he doesn't like
the look of this young stud - especially the way his girl Lola (Sheila Frazier)
keeps giving him sideways bedroom looks. Slim though has no choice but to
take on the newcomer and gets taught a pool lesson. The barfly Nathan (Adolph
Caesar) sees this take place and decides to cut himself in with Otis - and
tells him to run for it. And keep running - but first a stop at the local
integrated bordello where cards, bourbon and women go down easily.
Nathan bets a few other customers that Otis
can satisfy three women in thirty-minutes and Otis goes to work. Well, Lola
wants some of that, so she takes the number three position. She must have
seen Super Fly (in fact, Frazier was in the film). Now they really better
get out of town before Slim comes for them. Nathan begins setting up underground
fights for Otis- bare-knuckle till one man can't get up - but Slim keeps
after him. A couple of ok fights - one against this short kung fu guy who
as it turns out can't take a punch. A little topless nudity and a couple
slugfests but it needed more energy and some razzmatazz.
