Customer Reviews

Hollywood Shuffle [VHS]

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This has got to be the funniest movie I have ever watched, and the fact that Townsend put so much into getting it made makes me appreciate it even more. While the film touches on a very important subject concerning the downfalls of being a black actor, it still manages to keep the humor alive and strong. Highly recommend this film to all aspiring actors and all those who just love a good laugh.

Hollywood shuffle is pound for pound, the best comedy of all-time. It was made on a budget of seventeen dollars. Each actor plays an average of 7 roles. The very idea of white acting coaches teaching black actors how to act black {"jive turkey (...)!"} is brilliant. Chapelle tapped into the same vein when he dreamed up his blind black white-supremacist sketch. 'Night of the living Street Pimps' inspired many a halloween costume and Keenan Ivory Wayans as Jeri-Kurl is the funniest (...) ever, period. This movie is brilliant on so many levels and there's nothing else that compares to it. It's a nice history lesson for anyone who wants to know what 1987 was like, when the only rap on Mtv was Run-Dmc and LL Cool J. Watch it with some ho-cakes, a winkie-dinkie burger, winkie-dinkie donuts, winkie-dinkie dip and of course, a winkie-dinkie DAWGGGG!!!!!

This film is a classic. When I first saw it as a kid, I just thought it was funny, not realizing that it had a message as well as being comical. I don't know what my favorite scene is, but there are some classics such as Rambro, and Black Acting School. Keep an open mind when watching this film and try not to forget, in between laughs, that Townsend does have a serious theme about disrmination in Hollywood.

Hollywood Shuffle is a spoof of many of the 'blaxploitation' films of the seventies. This was hollywood's introduction to Robert Townsend, as he wrote and starred in the film, reportedly financing it with credit cards.

Townsend stars as an actor trying to break into the bigtime. He finds it tough to break out of the hollywood ideas for black actors. The movie sends up several popular films, including Dirty Harry and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Be sure to look for the Siskel and Ebert parody.

Not very deep, and probably not for those who can't laugh at themselves. Some of the humor might be considered insensitive. I consider it hilarious.

This is a movie I could watch again and again--and have. Anyone who watches "Hollywood Shuffle" and misses the obvious point of the movie--the lack of positive roles for talented African-Americans in Hollywood--is not paying attention. The silly spoofs of Siskel and Ebert and Blaxploitation flicks are funny ways to enhance Townshend's point. I first saw this movie when I was in high school and now, more than 15 years later, I still remember the funny lines: "That movie was effervescent!" "Make my day?!?! Do fifty bullets in your a$$ make your day?" "Winkie Dinkie hoe cakes? Yeah, 'cause hoes got ta eat, too!" "There's always work at the Post Office." Unfortunately, a serious version (like Spike Lee's "Bamboozled") would have never received such high acclaim.

Hollywood shuffle is without a doubt one of the funniest movies I have ever seen.All the more amazing is the fact that it is a polictical vehicle.Directing attention to a need for greater civil awareness in films,as well as a call to abandon stuborn race-based type casting. When I watch this film I am enchanted with the assertive and empathetic feel of it's overall drive-Robert Townsend has a wonderful sense of humor and he is fighting the good fight. As a person with white skin-I feel he is a good teacher of some much needed lessons in understanding one another.

This movie was side-splitting. I really enjoyed it,especially when Robert waxes rapsodic. I also liked his Grandmother's wisdom. And the responsibility he felt towards his younger brother by not being in a film that only brings more negativity to the black race. This movie was very funny, but also has some very good family value issues in it.

Robert Townsend hit the nail on the proverbial head with this movie that exposes the foolishness and racism that permeates Hollywood, and the changes that blacks and Latinos have to endure just to audition for a simple movie. The moral of this flick, of course, is that you don't have to sell out because, after all, "there's always work at the post office." Not only is this a lie (there ain't too much work anywhere for a black man), but it oversimplifies the issue: talent should speak for itself and black people should not have to be relegated to "coon roles," "slave skits" and drug dealer pimp scenarios when whites are playing a wide gamut of roles, many of them that they aren't even qualified for. Highlights of this incredibly lucid movie are the two brothers who review movies ala Ebert and Roeper, including one about "the attack of the zombie pimps;" the flashback/dream that Bobbie has of himself as a detective in Sam Ace; Keenan Wayans' hilarious portrayal of a thug named "Jerry Curl;" a TV star who plays a black bat that lives in a white suburban house, "Battie Boy;" and who can forget Winky Dinky Dog, the place where Bobby works, a place where you can really advance ("Look at Tiny; he's only been here six months, and he's assistant crew chief .... Look at me -- I went from two dollars to two sixty five. I got responsibility!"). But Bobby will have none of that. A touching scene in a barber shop where his uncle tells him to never give up on his dreams the way he (the barber) did, puts much needed emotion and seriousness into what is otherwise a laugh-a-minute parody. One of the lines in the movie that Bobby is auditioning for, a stereotype-riddled flick directed by whites, is "why you wanna pull a knife own me? I don't be got no weapon." Laughs for days.

In 1987 on a limited budget Robert Townsend released one of the most groundbreaking as well as most underrated films, which still receives little recognition. In Hollywood Shuffle Townsend confronts dignity, self pride, racism, stereotypes, and the loss of cultural consciousness all merged together in one film. Not only is this movie hysterically funny, but what Townsend relays in the film is sadly true and still exists today in Hollywood. Townsend intelligently displays how African-American actors were and still in some cases are subjected to playing certain roles such as thieves, butlers, gangsters, pimps, and drug dealers for example. Hollywood Shuffle also indicates that in some instances African American actors limit their own potential for success. This is an excellent film that was way well ahead of it's time. Hollywood Shuffle has a striking resemblance to Bamboozled, which should be sited as that film's predecessor. This movie not only causes you to laugh hysterically in tears. But in the same sense it promotes awareness and teaches a very important lesson to those unaware of African American struggle in Hollywood. This film also launched the careers of Damon Wayans, Keenan Ivory Wayans, Rusty Cundieff, and Anne Marrie Johnson. Children should see this movie, despite the explicit language

This movie is a classic comedy of importance. Written by and starring Robert Townsend and Keenan Ivory Wayans, this is a under watched yet innovative film. It tells the story of a young black actor who, while auditioning for a role, imagines himself in different movies.

"Black Acting School" teaches you have to play pimps, muggers, and punks. Light skinned blacks need not apply.

This film includes some wonderful, yet underutilized black actors, like Anne-Marie Johnson, John Witherspoon, & Helen Martin and highlights the long road to making black movie in Hollywood.

"Death of a Break Dancer" is a Sam Spade style noir piece, with Damon Wayans as the snitch and Keenan Ivory Wayans as `Jheri Curl'.

When Bobby is finally cast in a movie, he struggles with the movie's sterotypes vs his own values. Filled with black and latino sterotypes are over the top and truly unrealistic, causing him to feel like he is betraying not only himself, but his family.

It is interesting that 20 years after this movie was made, it is still relevant. There is still a dearth of good roles for black people.

This is one of the monologues, which speaks to following your dreams:

"What if you do make it? What if you are that good? You can never know until you try. You gotta give it your all. You gotta give it everything you got. I know, cause it happened to me. I stopped believing in me, I started listening to all those other people tell me what I couldn't do. I kept listening and listening until one day I started believing them. I quit. When I was singing, I was the happiest man alive. There ain't nothing to it, but to do it." Uncle Ray to Bobby