THE BLACK GESTAPO (1975, d. Lee Frost)
Finally, my dear Scumbags (or, should I say, my dear Jive Turkeys?), it’s time to discuss blaxploitation. Technically it’s not the first time the funkiest of genres has graced this fair internet site: we’ve previously covered Ebony, Ivory & Jade, which has traces of blaxploitation in it, but consists more heavily of a women’s prison film, a shot of a dummy getting kung-fu’d, and a bunch of boring nonsense. But no more half measures! Today, we’re getting knees deep in the dy-no-mite waters of blaxploitation, I’m talking perfectly manicured afros, I’m talking overwrought Shakespearian dialogue delivery, I’m talking a soundtrack full of nothing but stone cold grooves until the break of dawn, woman! And what better way to cruise down blaxploitation lane than to discuss a title that is, shall we say, rather eye-catching. A title that is seemingly designed to give old white conservatives a heart attack. A title that, politically speaking, doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but shut yo mouth, cause we’re talkin’ bout 1975’s The Black Gestapo!
Watts. Los Angeles. The ghett-ooooooooo. White mobsters who have names like Vito despite the fact that they all kinda look like Kris Kristofferson are running amok all over town. They’re shaking down businesses! They’re funding pushers and pimps! They’re beating up prostitutes! It’s a whole thing, but luckily some local brothers have started a group called the People’s Army, which we learn was started with a government grant. This is the first sign that this film takes place in a fantasy world, even in a progressive blue state like California, it’s beyond insane to imagine that the government would ever willingly fund a group of black men in military garb in a post-Panthers society. But here’s the thing: the group’s leader, General Ahmed, is a pacifist in his activism. He only cares about providing food and shelter for the homeless, and getting drugs off the street; if he’s gotta work with The Man in order to get that done, so be it! When we meet Ahmed, he’s giving a speech to a very small group of very disinterested Watts residents, who receive his message of picking oneself up by the bootstraps with decidedly muted applause. Meanwhile, Ahmed’s second in command, Colonel Kojah, seems to have other ideas. This is conveyed by a sudden cut to actual news footage of Hitler greeting his troops, which turns deep black before the blaring funk of the soundtrack greets the title card. Holy shit! That’s certainly one way to start your movie!
Ahmed goes to check in on the local medical center, where his on again off again woman, Marsha, works as a nurse. Mere moments later, Marsha is just trying to walk home, when Vito and his lil buddy start harassing her, implying that she’s a prosititute and all sorts of jive turkey behavior. Marsha, because she don’t take no shit, slaps Vito, and a classic blaxploitation kung-fu fight ensues. Yaaaay! Kojah sees this as his opportunity to make moves: he goes to Ahmed and is like, hey man, your woman almost got raped and beaten in broad daylight today, I wanna start a “security force.” Ahmed, who ain’t no dummy, is like, Kojah, dude, I know you, and I know that you’re probably gonna use this so-called “security force” as a convenient excuse to start a race war. Kojah is like, um, no I’m not. To which Ahmed is like, ok fine, I’ll give you six men, don’t make me regret this. Meanwhile, the white mobsters are having a business meeting. I love these types of scenes in genre movies, these scenes that imply that criminal organizations are run like corporate boardrooms. The lead gangster, Vincent, has a little dog and looks so much like Higgins from Magnum Pol.I. that I had to look and make sure that he wasn’t played by John Hillerman (turns out he’s being played by the film’s director, Lee Frost). Vincent is like, hey Vito, this one pimp hasn’t payed up, take your lil buddy and figure it out.
Vito and his lil buddy go and visit this prostitute, who for some reason has a Disneyland pendant on her wall, which is a weird decision on the part of the art director. Anyway, this begins a trend of white women being used as scantily clad sex objects in this film. Every white woman who appears onscreen is only there to show her breasts. In fact, the film doesn’t do much better by Marsha, either: when she’s not being raped or assaulted, she’s pretty much nothing more than an angry black woman stereotype. Given that this is the genre that gave us Pam Fucking Grier, the misogyny herein is disappointing, to say the least. Anyway, Vito and his lil buddy continue searching for the pimp, while Kojah meets with an old military buddy who looks like Bill Withers. Bill Withers is like, man, I think your boss is a jive-ass brother, to which Kojah is like, I agree, he sucks, so we’re gonna start some new shit, and I need you as my right hand man. Meanwhile, Vito and lil buddy are at this bar, when Vito spots Marsha and is like, you know what, we can shake that pimp down later, I’ve got unfinished business with this lady. Cut to a horrific beating and rape scene, which, no thanks, I didn’t ask for that.
Kojah and his six troops show up at Marsha’s house the next day and is like, hey sister, tell me who did this to you. Marsha is like, since it won’t make any difference because they’re mobbed up AF, it was Vito. Kojah is like, ok cool, byeeeeee. Cut to Kojah and his six troops breaking into Vito’s house in the middle of the night. Vito is enjoying a nice relaxing bath, a choice he will soon come to regret. The troops burst in, and all I could think was how impressive it was that they pulled off this scene in such a small bathroom. Anyway, Kojah pulls out a straight razor, CASTRATES VITO, AND FLUSHES HIS JUNK DOWN THE GODDAMN TOILET AND VITO BLEEDS TO DEATH!!! WHOA MOMMA!!! This of course kicks off the race war that Ahmed was afraid of, whoops. Vincent, who is just trying to sleep with his very annoyed, very topless lady friend, is more than happy to retaliate. A bunch of gangsters are killed, but a bunch of Kojah’s men are also killed. This culminates in lil buddy’s death scene, which is wonderful. He’s driving down the freeway when a car full of buh-buh-buh-baaaaabes pull up next to him. He’s like, heeeeey! And then one of them pulls out a single boob, and he literally giggles like a child. Oh whoops, then they side swipe him, and this car goes careening off of a goddamn cliff. It is ruined something fierce! Somehow lil buddy survives, but whoops, there’s Kojah and his men, and they’re packing heat. They shoot at lil buddy a bunch, then they throw a Molotov cocktail at his car. Damn, that’s some cold dinner. Vincent decides to get the hell outta town, lamenting the fact that he should’ve stayed in Harlem in the first place. I’ve gotta agree with him, Harlem is great! My sister lives there! Maison du Harlem is a great restaurant!
So now that they’ve tasted victory, Kojah is like, alright, time to go full on black gestapo up in this piece! Suddenly he’s got this palatial mansion compound where his troops are trained and there’s a swimming pool and all the white women they’d ever want to sock it to. Oh and look, they’ve eschewed the khaki and red fatigues favored by Ahmed in exchange for some black uniforms, complete with…oh, yup, shit, that’s an actual Third Reich officer’s hat that Kojah is now wearing. He works his troops up into a frenzy with his fiery speechifying, which culminates in them all chanting “Revenge! Revenge! Revenge!” Just in case we somehow missed the point in this, the chant then transitions into a recording of a bunch of Nazis chanting “Sieg heil!” Thanks, movie.
Somehow all of these new developments totally elude Ahmed, who decides to go to Marsha and be like, hey woman, this movie’s runtime needs some padding out, wanna make sweet sweet love to me? Marsha is like, sure why not. While these boots are being knocked, the black gestapo is running roughshod all over Watts. They’ve basically replaced the mobsters; now it’s Kojah and his troops that the local businesses are paying for “protection,” it’s Kojah and his troops who are funding the pushers and the pimps, and it’s Kojah and his troops who are beating up that poor prostitute who just wants to go back to Disneyland from the beginning of the movie. This upsets the citizens of Watts, who think that the People’s Army are responsible for Kojah’s bullshit, so they respond by bombing the local medical center. Marsha is, shall we say, less than thrilled about this, so she goes to Ahmed and is like, get your ass out of my bed and go get ya boy! Rightfully so, Marsha.
Ahmed goes to visit Kojah at his compound and is like, what the hell bro, didn’t I warn you about starting a race war, I gave you an inch and you took a mile, the streets are worse than they ever were when the mob was in town, and worst of all Marsha is pissed off at me! Kojah just fucking shrugs his shoulders and is like, whatever man, go feed some homeless people like a weak ass pussy, we ain’t homies no more. Ahmed is like, fine with me, much like Michael Showalter in that one sketch from The State, I’m outta here! At which point Kojah is like, hey Bill Withers, go pick up some drugs from a very cliche looking blaxploitation drug dealer so that I can sell them to the community, I’m sure this won’t backfire on me at all.
So Bill Withers goes and picks up these drugs from Not-Superfly, but oh cripes, a bunch of dudes in People’s Army uniforms steal the drugs! Bill Withers interrupts Kojah mid fuck sesh with a white lady to be like, the drugs got stolen, and you know that Ahmed had something to do with it, let’s kill him. Kojah is like, yeah, fine, kill him. So Bill Withers and co. track Ahmed down, shoot him, and he falls down a hill. However, they make the mistake of being too lazy to actually go down this hill and make sure that he’s dead. Way to half-ass your one job, Bill Withers!
Unfortunately for the black gestapo, this assassination attempt inexplicably turns Ahmed into a Rambo super soldier. The last half hour of the film is essentially him infiltrating the compound and fucking up everyone in sight; it makes no goddamn sense from a character perspective, but oh man is it awesome. Just shootouts and explosions and kung-fu fights galore! So Ahmed basically blows everyone up with booby traps, until only Kojah and Bill Withers are left alive. Ahmed makes Kojah drop his gun into the pool, but then Bill Withers sneaks up behind Ahmed and gets him in a headlock. Kojah pulls out his straight razor, and we know what THAT’S for, but then Ahmed karate kicks Kojah, and Bill Withers gets his throat slit by the straight razor! Whoa! Then Ahmed and Kojah have their final fight…in the pool! Underwater showdown, holy heck! Ahmed gets the rifle from the bottom of the pool and shoots Kojah dead! Again, underwater! So miss me with this nonsense that black people can’t swim! Ahmed stumbles out of the compound. Freeze frame on Kojah’s dead body floating in the pool. Cue the funk!
Aside from all of the unfortunate misogynistic bullshit, The Black Gestapo has everything that you could want from a blaxploitation film. The dialogue and acting is enjoyably over the top, the violence is pulpy and low rent and awesome, and of course the soundtrack kicks fucking ass. And on top of all that, the film manages to capture a pivotal moment in the history of the civil rights movement, when there was a schism in the Black Panthers between those who wanted to provide community service and those who wanted violent revolution. What doesn’t quite track however, is the whole gestapo connection. Aside from it being a big, splashy, attention-grabbing title, it’s hard to imagine a black revolutionary finding any sort of inspiration from the Third Reich, who were, surprise surprise, pretty fucking racist against black people. Then again, this is true of basically all blaxploitation films: the social context is there if you want it, but if you wanna just watch a bunch of honkies get kung-fu kicked to a blaring funk soundtrack, then you do you, my brother. You do you.
