Pam Grier is Foxy Brown

After Leo the Lion roars to inform us that we are about to watch a movie from Metro Goldwyn Mayer, we sees stars against a night sky that form the word “Orion.” Oh, so it’s an Orion picture and not from MGM. As quickly as Orion disappears, an A in a circle appears followed by the name of American International.

Foxy Brown, the movie being introduced by three different studios (two of them now defunct), immediately identifies itself as a movie from the early 1970s with its garishly colorful opening titles (sort of cut-rate Maurice Binder). Pam Grier, the beautiful black actress in the title role, is shaking her booty while the names of her co-stars appear on screen, and this viewer asks “Whatever happened to“? when he spots the name of Peter Brown. He was Chad Cooper, one of the Texas Rangers on Laredo, a TV western that was a favorite in my youth. After it ended its two-year run in 1967, his career must have hit the skids since Foxy Brown, despite its charms (Pam Grier), is grade C stuff. Another co-star, Antonio Fargas was on the rise, soon to be cast in a recurring role on TV’s Starsky and Hutch. He often turned up in movies as funny, trash-talking street hustlers before dying from AIDS-related complications some time ago. Brown and Fargas are bad guys in Foxy Brown. The good guy, who isn’t around long, is Terry Carter, a sidekick for many years on NBC’s McCloud.

Low-budget or not, Foxy Brown is enjoyable mainly due to Grier who acquired many devoted fans through her appearances in the kind of movies categorized as “black exploitation.” She’s a good actress and beautiful to boot. Sexy, too, but despite ample breasts, she exudes sensuality more than cheap sex appeal.

Brian W. Fairbanks

© 2009 Brian W. Fairbanks


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