REVIEW: Coffy (1973)

1973, American International Pictures

Director:
Jack Hill
Producer:
Robert A. Papazian
Writer:
Jack Hill

Cast:
Pam Grier [Coffy], Booker Bradshaw [Howard Brunswick], Robert DoQui [King George], William Elliott [Carter], Allan Arbus [Arturo Visconti], Sid Haig [Omar], Barry Cahill [McHenry]

Plot:
Coffy works in the daytime as a nurse. However, she is on a personal quest of vengeance. Her younger sister had been forced to take drugs and as a result, she is a patient at the hospital. Coffy poses as a local hooker who picks up drug dealers and then goes after them. With help from aspiring politician Howard, Coffy gets more information on two of the top drug dealers of the city, King George and Arturo Visconti. She decides to start a war by playing both sides of the equation against each other. However, Coffy soon realizes that there is more than there seems to be.

Review:
Writer/director Jack Hill teams up with one of his discoveries, Pam Grier, in this classic Blaxploitation action film. As the titular character, Grier delves as perhaps the prototype for films like LA FEMME NIKITA (1990) and NAKED KILLER (1992). While the more recent films depict the sexuality in terms of its use in the assassin world, Grier uses her sexuality here to start a war between drug dealers all in the name of revenge. However, unlike the assassins of today, Coffy is a everywoman with a regular job, in this case, a nurse.

The film has the central theme of revenge as she goes after the dealers for her little sister, who has been victimized by drugs. While the drug dealer who was responsible for her sister’s undoing is never revealed, Coffy is a one-woman army against all the drug dealers. In the first ten minutes, she blows a dealer’s head off with a shotgun with the embers still flying into the dealer’s afro. In the spirit of the 1966 spaghetti western DJANGO, Coffy learns of the two biggest drug dealers and decides to play them against each other. To show the racism of one of the drug dealers, he has his ally/nemesis killed in a way that was done in the days of history.

The film offers an interesting twist at the end and it is this film’s success that Hill originally wanted a sequel. The movie would have been called BURN, COFFY, BURN. However, the film’s production company opted not to do a sequel. However, Hill prompted to make a new action film with Pam Grier with practically the same premise. That film would be the more popular FOXY BROWN, released nine months after this film was released.

COFFY truly is a great film. While the typical plot themes of Blaxploitation are there, one can’t help but see Pam Grier blow someone’s head off (both yes and no pun intended) all in the name of revenge.

AlbertV’s Rating: B+