Cleopatra Jones

1973 "6 feet 2" and all of it Dynamite!"
5.9| 1h29m| PG| en
Details

After federal agent Cleopatra Jones orders the burning of a Turkish poppy field, the notorious drug lord Mommy vows to destroy her.

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Reviews

Alicia I love this movie so much
FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.
Jonah Abbott There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.
talisencrw Needless to say, my favourite Quentin Tarantino film is 'Jackie Brown'. I enjoyed the action, and Tamara Dobson was gorgeous (I can't believe she was 6'2"! Wow!). I wish she had done more movies, and hadn't died so young (at age 59, of pneumonia and multiple sclerosis). Though director Starrett (who died even younger, of kidney failure) mainly did TV work, I loved his 'Race with the Devil', which was from around this time. He was very good at these kind of films, at both presenting action set-pieces and building suspense.I would like to see ALL of these 'urban action' films. Though from my movie-watching experience, I find that I tend to prefer films from before 1970, these films from the 70's are great too, and are a lot more enjoyable to me than most films I see today.I sincerely hope that, like in 'Cleopatra Jones', the filmmakers of today could concentrate on actors' presence and stunts, rather than simply go with CGI. I for one would be a lot happier as a cinephile.
Wizard-8 While I'm not saying that "Cleopatra Jones" is a BAD example of the blaxploitation genre - it's fun to a certain degree - there are some aspects of it that will likely disappoint viewers in this day and age. The movie is indeed well produced, and while Tamara Dobson is a little awkward in the moments involving action, she does otherwise make a charismatic lead. As the lead bad guy, Shelley Winters is campy and a lot of fun in her scenes. Strangely, however, she only appears for a few minutes in total - a movie like this really needs a villain who regularly shows up to cause trouble. Another problem with the screenplay is that Cleopatra Jones seems mighty slow tracking down the bad guys - her investigation moves at a crawl. It's also strange that Cleopatra Jones is also offscreen several times for significant periods of time. Despite these problems, the movie is still worth a look. It is occasionally fun, and it's one of the few blaxploitation movies outside of Pam Grier movies to showcase a black actress in a lead role.
wainscoat-1 I saw this film the weekend it came out in 1973 in downtown Baltimore, Tamara Dobson's hometown. Although that was 36 years ago, I remember it very well.1973 was about 5 years past the golden age of the beautiful but unbeatable-in-a-fight female heroine. A total fantasy, but as a middle-aged woman now, I still sometimes ask myself "What would Emma Peele do?" I found the early '70's heroines to be complete wimps compared to the late 60's heroines.So when the ad campaign hit in 1973 for "Tamara Dobson IS Cleopatra Jones," with the poster of the tall gun-toting Ms. Dobson, I begged and begged to go.I went downtown with an older woman friend of the family, and the two of us were literally the only white people in the entire packed theater of black people.In the film. the villains are all white and the good guys are all black. Also, there are many many scenes in which white people are killed by black people. During these scenes, the theater cheered wildly. This is probably not something you would notice watching the film on T.V., but believe me, if you are one of two white people in the theater, it makes a big impression.There was also a well-written and clever scene in the film in which one of Cleopatra's male assistants is lying in wait for the white villains. When they arrive, he pulls a gun on them and says "Guess what just jumped out of the woodpile?" The older woman who took me to the movie was southern. She thought this joke was hysterical and kept trying to explain it to me several times, with her extremely clear explanations catching the attention of everyone sitting around us. For those of you not blessed by an older southern friend, the phrase "Guess what just jumped out of the woodpile?" refers to the expression "N-word in the woodpile," a southern term for an unpleasant surprise.So what did I learn in my trip to the movies? 1) The term "blaxploitation" is totally false. This "blaxploitation" movie seemed to be about blacks who were superior in every way to whites, both morally and physically.2) It is really scary and uncomfortable being in the minority.
mu_min It deserves to be seen because it features the incredible Antonio Fargas, as a mob little boss, with cool clothes and hilarious jive talking. In my opinion Antonio is a great actor, each time i saw him i was stunned by his rhythmic talking and the way he moves. It deserves to be seen because it features Shelley Winters as Mommy, a lesbian red-head old mob chieftain whose angriness and sadism are really funny to see (in my European DVD, there is no scene in which she receives a feet massage!). Plot, kung-fuish fight scenes are not fantastic, Tamara Dobson who plays the leading role is a nice-looking tall woman who does not play very well and does not do really sexy stuff (she does not match with Pam Grier), but i nevertheless had a good moment seeing this movie, and i hope you will too. Cleopatra drives an awesome car, the car chase scene is good, and she wears a majestic afro haircut, and like Pam Grier in Foxy Brown she changes clothes before each scene, it's like a fashion review, it is cool.