Warner Bros. Pictures
The 1970s was a unique time for cinema, much as it was for music. People say the world changed from the innocence of the 1950s following the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the Vietnam War in the 1960s, and that change was reflected by harder-edged music and more gritty, realistic movies. And with the Civil Rights movement, the early 70s also saw the rise of what became known as ‘Blaxploitation Cinema’, films that had a strong Black presence behind the camera and a prominent cast of Black actors on the screen. These films, mostly independently produced, were aimed at urban African-American audiences, but the appeal grew and Hollywood jumped on the bandwagon, putting a little more money behind their own productions, toned down as they were to appeal to a wider range of audiences. 1971’s Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song is credited as one of the first influential Blaxploitation films, and some may argue that the bigger budgeted Shaft, also from 1971 by a major studio, was also a contributing force to propelling the genre. It wasn’t until 1973, however, that a Blaxploitation film had a Black woman in the leading role and in fact two movies that year featured female protagonists — Coffy, with Pam Grier, and Cleopatra Jones with Tamara Dobson. Cleopatra Jones was actually the first film in production but producers rushed the production of Coffy to get it to the screen first, two months ahead of Cleo.
Review
Baltimore-born Tamara Dobson stars as the titular heroine and when we first meet her she’s somewhere in the Middle East leading the bombing of a massive poppy field. It’s not revealed until Cleopatra’s arrival back in the US — following an attack on her life at the airport in which she memorably sneak attacks her assailants by arriving via luggage carousel — that she’s a US Agent working for the president’s drug task force. But the bombing of that poppy field triggers an all-out war with local drug kingpin, or rather queenpin ‘Mommy’ (Shelley Winters), who has lost $30 million in profit and has her sights set on taking out Cleo. Her first move is to get the B&S House (which stands for Brothers & Sisters), a sort of community center/halfway house run by Cleo’s boyfriend Reuben (Bernie Casey) for young people attempting to get off drugs and back into society, raided and shut down by having a crooked cop on her payroll plant drugs on one of the residents. Luckily Cleo and the Chief of Police (Dan Frazer) have a good working relationship and he was out of the loop when the raid took place, so the two vow to work together to get to the bottom of the raid and bring down Mommy. Along the way, Cleo has to deal with other’s in Mommy’s organization, including Doodlebug Simkins (Antonio Fargas), who denies working for Mommy but then sets himself up for a whole world of trouble by notifying Mommy that he’s going to build his own army in his own territory, which also puts his innocent chanteuse girlfriend Tiffany in danger.
The movie features a thrilling and impressive car chase as Cleo avoids several of Mommy’s army racing through the streets of Los Angeles (and the LA River) in her Chevy Corvette, and an unintentionally hilarious climax in a junkyard. And while the statuesque Dobson (she was 6′ 2″) cuts an impressive figure on screen with her endless costume changes, her performance is just fine (she seems to always have a smile on her face even in more dire circumstances). But the film was popular enough to generate a sequel in 1975, Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold, so hopefully Warner Archive will get around to restoring that one for a Cleo Double Feature (that film is currently available on DVD only). Dobson, unfortunately, did not have a long acting career with her last film Chained Heat released in 1983. She also appeared in twelve episodes of the 1978 Saturday morning series Jason of Star Command, with her final role coming in the 1984 TV movie Amazons. Sadly, Dobson was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2000 and she died in Baltimore in 2006.
The real draw to the movie, however, is the completely over-the-top performance from Shelley Winters. As Mommy she makes a memorable entrance as a jump cut from the burning poppy field to Mommy shrieking and berating her henchmen is unintentionally hilarious. And she never lets up. Even when she’s not yelling at or beating someone, she’s still pulling all the focus in the scene. It may not be Miss Winters’ proudest moment, considering a year earlier she was Oscar nominated for The Poseidon Adventure, but she give it her all and makes for a wildly entertaining villain.
Warner Bros. Pictures
Video
To say the video presentation of Cleopatra Jones is stunning is am understatement. A film from 1973 with a budget of just over $3 million — most of which it seems when to Cleo’s wardrobe — and the notoriously grainy film stock of the era should not look this good. The colors of the flaming poppy field and Cleo’s outfits really pop (sadly a lot of the sets are a bit drab in their color schemes), and the video presentation retains a beautiful film-like quality without an overabundance of grain. Just looking at the presentation now, you would almost swear the film was made today.
Audio
This was 1973, so the audio is nothing spectacular. The Blu-ray retains the original mono mix but the dialogue has a nice clarity to it, never overshadowed by J.J. Johnson’s score. It’s a crisp, clear presentation overall.
Special Features
Unfortunately, the only bonus feature is the film’s trailer which, oddly, features no onscreen text. But the value in the trailer is that you can compare the look of it to the film presentation to see how much work went into restoring the film.
Overview
I really didn’t think I was going to enjoy Cleopatra Jones, especially in an era where an ironic film like Black Dynamite exists, but I did. The film plays a bit campy today through some of the performances, but it actually has a decent message in showing the young Black people attempting to get their lives in order at the B&S House. It may also have some questionable messaging in that almost all of the White cops are crooked, save for the Chief, but that distrust of the police by the Black community still resonates today. Cleopatra Jones is a product of its time but it still feels contemporary and at just under 90 minutes, it’s an entertaining watch.
Warner Archive generously provided Hotchka with the Blu-ray for reviewing purposes.
Cleopatra Jones has a running time of 1 hour 29 minutes and is rated PG.
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