<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
and <\/span><\/i>women in action<\/i><\/b>,<\/span><\/i> Caroline Said delves into the history of female-led action films, exploring what these stories say about gender and how the portrayal of female action heroes has evolved over time.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n Action filmmaking has a certain tone that has emerged from recent times.<\/span> mission: impossible <\/span><\/i>enthusiasm, <\/span>star wars <\/span><\/i>Sequels and domination of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Audiences fell in love with a film that was funny without sacrificing pathos, ensemble-driven without losing focus on its protagonists, sexy without being sexual, and gently progressive without overpowering its love of great action sequences. If 1980s action was sophisticated, 1990s action was sophisticated, and 2000s action was overly stylized, there is a trend in modern action filmmaking that takes itself seriously without taking itself seriously. <\/span>too much<\/span><\/i> Seriously. In retrospect, it’s remarkable to discover that this distinctly modern tone returned fully formed in the 1973 blaxploitation classic. <\/span>Cleopatra Jones. <\/span><\/i>Tamara Dobson’s 6-foot-2-inch dynamite does just that in a day. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Warner Bros. heroine was released in theaters two months after Pam Grier, but <\/span>Shattered the blaxploitation glass ceiling<\/span> and <\/span>Coffey, <\/span><\/i>These two characters are more of a contrast than an imitation. Either <\/span>Coffey <\/span><\/i>and its pseudo-sequel <\/span>foxy brown <\/span><\/i>Greer’s characters are rough, traumatized vigilantes seeking bloody vengeance outside the system, and only after suffering a high degree of abuse and sexualization in the process do they finally get it. Meanwhile, Dobson plays Cleopatra Jones, a fashionable special agent for the U.S. government who jets around on missions around the world, drives a Corvette Stingray with a special license plate, lives in a chic mansion in Los Angeles, and dispatches bad guys with sick karate moves. Greer’s R-rated film was intended, at least in part, to titillate 19-year-old boys; <\/span>cleopatra jones <\/span><\/i>This is a PG project with no sex or nudity. Unusual for the blaxploitation genre. <\/span><\/p>\n As with Batman and Superman, or James Bond and Jason Bourne, it’s in everyone’s cultural interest for both archetypes to exist. In fact, it’s kind of surprising that audiences in 1973 were able to produce a double feature with two such vastly different black female action heroines. If this were to happen in Hollywood today, it would still be considered noteworthy. where <\/span>Coffey<\/span><\/i>filmmakers tend to be violently vulgar; <\/span>cleopatra jones <\/span><\/i>Director Jack Starrett (aka: <\/span>“A meaningless story on the frontier”<\/span> speech maker <\/span>blazing saddle<\/span><\/i>) and co-screenwriter Sheldon Keller. <\/span>The Dick Van Dyke Show. <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n <\/p>\n cleopatra jones <\/span><\/i>While not an outright parody, it develops a winking self-awareness akin to some of 007’s sillier work, and almost certainly inspired screenwriter and blaxploitation star Max Julien’s initial story pitch. (The trailer touts the female lead as “a soul sister’s answer to James Bond.”) Cleo enters the film stepping out of a helicopter wearing a chic fur-lined cloak on her way to blow up a Turkish opium field. To thwart the villains waiting to take her out at the airport, she boards a baggage merry-go-round and delivers a high kick to their face. She then opens a Batmobile-style compartment in the car’s door, revealing a collection of weapons hidden inside. At one point, she hopped on a dirt bike to prove she could do it too. One white male officer whispers to another white officer: “Kurt, have you ever felt inadequate?” <\/span><\/p>\n