Blaxploitation Movies as a Political Attempt against Racism

Abstract

The term “blaxploitation” is coined from the two words “black” and “exploitation”,reflecting on the core of this movie genre, which is the exploitation of black characters to appeal to the black population themselves. At their height during the 1970s, blaxploitation movies were an attempt to tell different stories about the black community, and were directors’ response to public criticism that black characters had always been stereotyped as the bad guys in Hollywood movies. In this article, the writer investigates the blaxploitation movies in their historical contexts to see how the anti-racialism thoughts and movements of the time were manifested in the movies. The writer also reviews criticism about the losses and victories of blaxploitation movie as a genre in trying to win the race battle. At the same time, comparisons are made between the blaxploitation movies with more recent movies made in the 1990s and 2000s on racial relationships, zooming in the way black and white characters are constructed and how the power relations are established among them. Such comparisons also reveal that racial crashes have taken a new tone, advocating conciliation instead of conflicts.