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Director: John Singleton (Boyz N the Hood, Poetic Justice) Starring: Samuel L. Jackson (Rules of Engagment, Pulp
Fiction) Rating: R (strong language and violence) "It's Guiliani time!" Shaft, getting ready to kick some major booty. Shaft is revival of the classic detective series of the 1970s when "Blaxploitation" was at the height of its popularity. This time, Samuel L. Jackson plays Shaft and is the nephew of the older Shaft, still played by Richard Roundtree. The movie keeps the classic Shaft theme and uses many of the techniques of a 1970s detective show with an early 21st century sensibility. The story starts with the senseless murder of a black youth by a rich white kid with a race problem. (Think an upper crust John Rocker.) The youth, who is well connected in New York City, gets placed on bail and flees to Europe for two years. Upon reentry, Shaft catches him. There was only one eyewitness to the murder, and she has disappeared, fearing for her life. The rich kid manages to put a hit out on her, and the race is on to see who will get to her first. The rich kid is played to perfection by Christian Bale, who may be in danger of being typecast as a psychotic rich kid. He plays Wade with a quiet fury of someone who has so much hate in his heart that he strikes out at those he feels are less than him. Vanessa Williams plays a secondary role as Shaft's backup, but her character is never really developed, which is a waste of Ms. Williams' acting talents. Samuel L. Jackson's Shaft is one bad mother-well, you get the picture. His performance is reminiscent of the one he gave in Pulp Fiction, except Shaft is a good guy deep down who focuses his anger against injustice. He liberally uses the f-word, and he is not as sensual as the Shaft of the 1970s, who had the libido of James Bond. All the "booty" he scores is off screen, but that is all right since it is Jackson's attitude that makes the character work. Considering the movie opened at #1, earning over $21.1 million, the likelihood of a sequel is high. The word-of-mouth on this movie
should be good. It is quite violent, and the f-word is overused,
but if you like Pulp Fiction, you'll love Shaft.
The same type of dark humor is present in both movies, and the
performances make you want to cheer at times as Shaft manhandles
everyone in sight. Hopefully, future installments of Shaft
will flesh out Vanessa Williams' character more as well as what
motivates John Shaft to be the man he is. Shaft
approaches the brilliance of Pulp Fiction, but
doesn't quite have the oomph of that movie. It is a great summer
action flick, and I highly recommend it to those who love the
genre. "You know me. It's my duty to please that booty." Shaft
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(out of five)