Customer Reviews

Guy from Harlem [VHS]

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4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Al Conners (Loye Hawkins) is a private eye who must save a kidnapped girl from crime syndicate types. Unfortunately, whoever made this pile of rancid matter had no idea what the basics of film-making are! Of course, there's loads of humor to go around, including the plaid polyester suits, platform shoes, towering afros, idiotic fight scenes, and "love" scenes w/ no nudity! Just hot babes in long, thick nightgowns that my granny would find too conservative! And check out that soundtrack! It's a stone groove, baby...

THIS IS TOTAL, AND UTTER TRASH! I MEAN A PERSON CAN ONLY HAVE SOO MUCH RETRO-70s CULTURE AND CHEESY ACTION SEQUENCES BEFORE HE OR SHE LOSES IT. OK...LET'S MAKE IT EASY. TAKE SHAFT, REMOVE EVERYTHING COOL, AND NOW ADD THE PLOT STRUCTURE OF A CONAN MOVIE AND A BAD 70s PORN, YOU HAVE THE GUY FROM HARLEM. IT'S SAD, WHEN THE HIGHEST BUDGET AMOUNT FOR THE FILM WAS ON THE FRO-SHEEN. SAD SAD SAD MOVIE.

I would rather go without Novocaine while getting my teeth pulled by an angel-dusted monkey using a Phillips screwdriver, than watch this schlock. This film centers on an implausible kidnapping, and a load of "filler material" at the beginning of the film, that features the protagonist protecting an African Princess whom he must protect but is more concerned with bedding.

The acting here and the badly choreographed karate fight scenes make
"Dolemite" look like "Enter The Dragon." Truly hammy acting and bad
editing make this film a must-see for burgeoning directors and editors so that they will know what NOT to do when creating an action film.

As in a lot of second-rate blaxploitation, the innuendo and nudity is
heavy. The dialogue is so corny, you suspect that black people had
little to do with it. Cookie cutter characters make this a really poor man's version of "Shaft," meaning this film is a bad (horrific)
mutha....I know, hush my mouth!

This (actually released under the title "The Guy from Harlem") is a terrible mid-1970s "thriller" starring nobody. The biggest features of the film are gigantic afros that barely fit through doorways, hideous polyester clothing, and otherworldly interior decorating from the most tasteless of all decades. The film begins with Wanda, a young African-American girl who has been kidnapped by Big Daddy's evil yet intensely stupid white gang. Next you are supposed to forget that, because the CIA commissions private investigator and mercenary bodyguard Al Connors (Loye Hawkins) to guard Mrs. Ashanti, the wife of an African "Chief of State," who happens to have the biggest afro of the entire cast and speak with a Harlem accent. Of course the first thing she needs is a massage, which leads to the queasiness of the audience when Al observes the proceedings for security reasons. Big Daddy wants to kidnap Mrs. Ashanti, too, but Al is too quick. Watch for the fight scene in the hotel room which contains the worst fight choreography I have seen in many years. Also watch for the dowdiest nightgowns in film history.

I should note that the film is technically horrendous: it is terribly written, poorly acted (people blow lines and they use the footage without question, people appear to be reading cue cards, etc.), and has essentially no production values. The film (at least this print) has many cuts and splices, numerous flaws, and a very noisy soundtrack which has a noise appearing at random intervals and lasting for several minutes at a time which sounds like a cross between a small, flatulent aircraft and a vibrating bed. This noise often overpowers the dialogue, though, so in that sense it's not an entirely bad development. Between the action scenes there are lots of scenes of driving around in a big red Cadillac, and an endlessly repeated song which consists largely of a bass guitar line and the lyrics "Get down!" and "That cat's a bad dude!"

Eventually a trio of emissaries comes to Al and ask him to take some money to Big Daddy to get Wanda (remember her?) back. Al takes the job and we never return to the whole CIA-Mrs. Ashanti axis of the film. In rescuing Wanda there is a lot of very bad karate, endless scuffling around, a lot of racist name calling from both factions and pretentious dialogue like "I want you to take a message to Big Daddy. Tell him he's next." Al not only gets Wanda back, but he rips Big Daddy off of his ransom money, which leads to a mano-a-mano battle between a shirtless Big Daddy and Al in the middle of nowhere. No points for guessing how the battle ends.

This film is incoherently made, has wretched acting, and embodies everything that was intrinsically wrong with racially-motivated 1970s films. The technical aspects of the film match the artistic elements, and I can't recommend this film to anyone for any reason.

"The Guy From Harlem" is a terrible mid-1970s "thriller" starring nobody. The biggest features of the film are gigantic afros that barely fit through doorways, hideous polyester clothing, and otherworldly interior decorating from the most tasteless of all decades. The film begins with Wanda, a young African-American girl who has been kidnapped by Big Daddy's evil yet intensely stupid white gang. Next you are supposed to forget that, because the CIA commissions private investigator and mercenary bodyguard Al Connors (Loye Hawkins) to guard Mrs. Ashanti, the wife of an African "Chief of State," who happens to have the biggest afro of the entire cast and speak with a Harlem accent. Of course the first thing she needs is a massage, which leads to the queasiness of the audience when Al observes the proceedings for security reasons. Big Daddy wants to kidnap Mrs. Ashanti, too, but Al is too quick. Watch for the fight scene in the hotel room which contains the worst fight choreography I have seen in many years. Also watch for the dowdiest nightgowns in film history.

I should note that the film is technically horrendous: it is terribly written, poorly acted (people blow lines and they use the footage without question, people appear to be reading cue cards, etc.), and has essentially no production values. The film (at least this print) has many cuts and splices, numerous flaws, and a very noisy soundtrack which has a noise appearing at random intervals and lasting for several minutes at a time which sounds like a cross between a small, flatulent aircraft and a vibrating bed. This noise often overpowers the dialogue, though, so in that sense it's not an entirely bad development. Between the action scenes there are lots of scenes of driving around in a big red Cadillac, and an endlessly repeated song which consists largely of a bass guitar line and the lyrics "Get down!" and "That cat's a bad dude!"

Eventually a trio of emissaries comes to Al and ask him to take some money to Big Daddy to get Wanda (remember her?) back. Al takes the job and we never return to the whole CIA-Mrs. Ashanti axis of the film. In rescuing Wanda there is a lot of very bad karate, endless scuffling around, a lot of racist name calling from both factions and pretentious dialogue like "I want you to take a message to Big Daddy. Tell him he's next." Al not only gets Wanda back, but he rips Big Daddy off of his ransom money, which leads to a mano-a-mano battle between a shirtless Big Daddy and Al in the middle of nowhere. No points for guessing how the battle ends.

This film is incoherently made, has wretched acting, and embodies everything that was intrinsically wrong with racially-motivated 1970s films. The technical aspects of the film match the artistic elements, and I can't recommend this film to anyone for any reason.