THE FILM & WATER PODCAST
Episode 58: FRIDAY FOSTER
Rob welcomes blogger and romance comics expert Jacque Nodell (SEQUENTIAL CRUSH) to discuss the 1975 action/thriller FRIDAY FOSTER starring Pam Grier!
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This movie sounds like a lot of fun. AIP’s 70s output is just on the fringe enough to never be boring, even if it’s not exactly “good”. But hey, they made the Count Yorga and Blacula movies! And Pam Grier was in Scream, Blacula Scream! The cast is just insanely awesome. I need to watch this.
Jackie’s blog and book sounds like a winner. I’ll be checking those out.
I think I’m going to change my name to Noble Franklin, because I love Scatman Caruthers.
Chris
Pam Grier is good in everything. Sometimes (ok, a lot of times) the movies aren’t that great, but she’s always lively. She’s dynamite in JACKIE BROWN, one of my all time favorite movies.
For more “Blaxploitation” goodness check out the IFC documentary Badass Cinema:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6eMscT5DAc
Lots of good commentary from Pam Grier. When I teach my Intro to Cinema course to undergrads at BGSU I always include a screening of Coffey (1973) where she’s a nurse by day and vigilante by night!
Love Coffy (which I misspelled, below) and Foxy Brown. Greg Hatcher did a great column at Comics Should Be Good, on the CBR.com site (before the revamp; good luck finding the archives, though here they are: http://www.cbr.com/author/greg-hatcher/ ) about Urban Heroes and how those movies were the superhero movies of the 70s (before the Donner Superman). I’ve got some of them (Shaft, Black Belt Jones, Black Samurai, Black Samson, Three the Hard Way, the Cleopatra Jones films); but not all of the great ones. he is right. Cleopatra Jones is a globetrotting secret agent, who could go one-on-one, with the Black Widow; Black Samson protects his neighborhood from criminals, while carrying a huge club and keeping a lion (!!!) in his bar. Three the Hard Way has Jim Kelly, Fred Williamson and Jim Brown as an Urban Justice League, fighting the always fun Jay Robinson (Dr. Shrinker, The Robe), as the cool and evil head of a white supremacist group, that has created a virus that kills only blacks (somehow).
ps. Also good are the trio of films from Sidney Poitier and Bill Cosby: Uptown Saturday Night, Let’s Do It Again, and A Piece of the Action. They are sort of a middle class response to the Blaxploitation films, with generally more positive messages in them. The first two are more pure comedies, while the third is a definite message picture, while still having some comedy and a bit of action, as Poitier is hiding out from a mobster, who he conned out of some serious bread. Cosby is a safecracker and the pair are being blackmailed by a mysterious person (James Earl Jones, a retired cop) into helping out a youth program, at a community center. The best of the bunch, for my money, is Let’s Do It Again, where they hypnotize Jimmy “JJ” Walker, as Bootney Farnsworth, into winning the heavyweight boxing championship. Great film, with a lot of twists and turns and a wonderful cast of African-American actors.
I remember watching the Poitier/Cosby movies as a kid, they were really fun.
nurse by day and vigilante by night!
How has that never been a comic book???
Like most men of my age, I love Pam Grier. Unfortunately, I don’t have Friday Foster (I’ve got Coffee and Foxy Brown). I’ll have to rectify that. The comic strip was neevr in my local paper, though I was aware of it. I did recent;y acquire scans of the old Menomonee Falls Gazette (which used to advertise in DC comics, of the early to mid 70s), which reprinted adventure and soap opera comic strips, which includes some Friday Foster. You can find that on the web.
When I was a kid, girls read comics; from the Harvey, Archie, and Gold key Disney stuff, to the still-existing romance comics. When those disappeared and comics pretty much became superheroes (and the Direct Market), girls all but disappeared from comics. These days, they are a huge audience; but, in bookstores, with manga and the works of authors like Raina Telgemeier. I know Louise Simonson pitched romance comics at Marvel, in conjunction with a publisher like Harlequin; but, was shot down. Seems like someone missed the boat, if you ask me.
Pam Grier’s films are awesome, esecially the Blaxploitation ones, as are Tamara Dobson’s two Cleopatra Jones films: Cleopatra Jones (with Shelly Winters) and Cleopatra Jones & the Casino of Gold (with Stella Stevens). If only Pam had had a chance to play Misty Knight (who was pretty much patterned after her). Anyone who loves these movies also needs to see Original Gangstas, with Grier, Fred Williamson, James Brown, Ron O’Neal and Richard Roundtree. It’s not as good as the original era films or the spoof, I’m Gonna Get You Sucka; but, it’s still great to see the old crowd on the screen.
Grier is the Coffy in the Arena that is my heart
Sorry for the lateness of this comment; I’ve had a hella busy summer, and have only begun catching up on some leisurely podcast listening over the past week, but I just had to respond to this one.
I just saw Friday Foster for the first time a little less than a year ago, and absolutely loved it, for all of the reasons you both mentioned and more. I’m particularly glad you noted its sex-positivity and the fact that it actually passes the Bechdel test; in many, quite a few of the so-called Blaxploitation films – despite coming under heavy criticism at the time (including from the NAACP among others) – often featured some surprisingly progressive aspects. And like Jeff noted above, citing Greg Hatcher, they were in many ways the first superhero films, with their over-the-top action and violence, borderline ridiculous but still oh-so-cool names and excellent outfits (yeah, I grew up in the ’70s, too, and unfortunately, real life was hardly as chique and glamorous as the way everybody always looks in these films).
Otherwise, I was also quite delighted that you had the wonderful Jacque Nodell as your guest co-reviewer. I quite warmly second your recommendation for her blog.