Regarding our post on Friday Foster, a reader writes:
“I like Longarón’s art a lot. [It’s] not too expensive to collect either. But that is some slack filmmaking! Just like the TV [shows] of the period.”
Sadly, we concur with the observation. Grier’s earlier films in Coffy and Foxy Brown had her portraying tough, intelligent women who could seduce a man one minute then crack a lamp across his teeth the next. It’s hard to imagine now, but this was rather groundbreaking in its day and helped pave the way for actresses such as Sigourney Weaver and Linda Hamilton who took on lead roles in action movies.
By contrast, her character in Friday Foster seems to stumble upon trouble and avoids danger mostly by luck. And while we do appreciate the who’s who of blaxploitation that appears in the film, the plot itself never rises to the level of television shows like Mission: Impossible. In many ways, Friday Foster became the genre’s swan song. By the time of its release, blaxploitation’s underlying social commentary was all but gone and klunky story lines became the norm. Some of the movie’s male performers, most notably Carl Weathers, Yaphet Kotto, and Scatman Crothers, would go to appear in more prominent films of the late 70s and early 80s including Rocky, Alien, and The Shining.
As for Grier herself, she mostly languished in small parts through the early 90s until director Quentin Tarrantino cast her to star in his 1997 homage to blaxploitation Jackie Brown.
(Image: Pam Grier in Friday Foster, AIP)
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