Blax-stage-ploitation

I love movies about the making of movies--even about making exploitation, trashy or so-bad-they're-good type films--the sort of picture where a good review is considered to be one claiming it "isn't fit for a dog to see; it is coarse, rude, crude and vulgar." Indeed, that's Rudy Ray Moore's 1975 Blaxploitation film "Dolemite" in a nutshell. These backstage pieces of cinema go back a long ways; when Charlie Chaplin made "Behind the Screen" in 1916, he'd already parodied filmmaking at least a handful of times in prior movies. An A-picture making fun of B or lower-grade filmmaking, however, may've began with "Ed Wood" (1994), about the eponymous so-called "worst director of all time." In the meantime, there has been such fictional schlock in "Get Shorty" (1995), "Boogie Nights" (1997), "Bowfinger" (1999) and "Tropic Thunder" (2008), to name a few, but "Dolemite Is My Name" is more in the humorous biopic tradition of "Ed Wood," written by the same guys, and the more-recent "The Disaster Artist" (2017). Heck, even Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood," partly about the none-too-glamorous business of making TV and Spaghetti Westerns, comes to mind, as does Spike Lee's homage to Blaxploitation films, "BlackKklansman" (2018). Perhaps, the best of the bunch, however, is another Netflix release, from last year, "The Other Side of the Wind," the newest film from director Orson Welles, who has been dead for over 30 years, ironically, about the making of a movie that's never finished. Well, Netflix has picked another winner here and one that may be looked back upon as reviving the career of its comedic star, Eddie Murphy, before he goes on to be in sequels to his hits from the 1980s and '90s and who I haven't seen this good since the last time he starred in films about showbiz, with his Oscar-nominated turn in "Dreamgirls" (2006) and his dual roles in the aforementioned, underrated "Bowfinger."

It's not only Murphy, though; the whole supporting cast is wonderful, especially Wesley Snipes playing against type as a quasi-effeminate, alcohol-abusing (and possibly cocaine) prima donna instead of his usual macho heroes (and occasional villains), although the role could also be read partly as a reflection of the actor's own real-life tarnished image. The appeal of these movies is that it's as though we're viewing the picture's own making, and everyone here seems to be having a blast doing it. It's also, rightly, quite aspirational. The Blaxploitation genre filled a void in Hollywood productions depicting African Americans on screen in a way that would appeal likewise to that demographic in the audience. The scenes here of the main characters attending the cinema, including the White-casted "The Front Page" (1974), as well as their own "Dolemite," pack a powerful punch in this respect. Even today, sure, there's, say, "Black Panther" (2018), where African Americans dominate the screen by, finally, as Murphy's Rudy Ray Moore alludes to in one scene, putting on capes and playing make-believe superheroes, but it took 18 entries in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to get there. Yet, the aspirational aspect isn't only about historical or continuing racial issues.

Exploitation cinema isn't only appealing because it may be in bad taste or to laugh at the acting or how it may be narratively and technically deficient. These cheaper, independent productions hold the appeal that just about anyone could do the same. I know, for instance, that I could never make anything like "Citizen Kane" (1941), but if I were so inclined to hustle, maybe I could do something along the lines of "Plan 9 from Outer Space" (1959), "The Room" (2003), or "the Citizen Kane of kung-fu pimpin' movies" itself, "Dolemite." Regardless of race or generation, from plantation, to hobo, record-store clerk, and struggling stand-up comedian and recording artist, we may all see ourselves reflected behind and on the screen.