Pet Peeves - Friday, December 14, 2018

This afternoon I started thinking how much I hate the term, "blaxsploitation". Don't ask me why this 70's movie genre label is on my mind now, it just grinds my gears. I'm puzzled why there was no objection to it from African Americans when the name came out in the 1970's. They weren't the greatest movies, many of them were not even B picture bad but just plain crappy, but what exactly was exploitave about them? There is no equivalent label for formulaic action movies starring Caucasian actors. The first blacksploitation films came out at a time when Hollywood films might have black actors only in supporting roles or if the film was a serious solemn drama about race relations. In a truly equal world films with black actors playing the leads would run the same full gamut of genres from romantic comedies to horror flicks and in quality from terrible to great. Sometimes I think "blacksploitation" came into usage because too many thought it was a clever sounding new term. It wasn't then and still isn't today. Thinking about blacksploitation and "chick flick" also came to mind. Ok, so in this world there are types of movies that women like more than men and vice versa but chick flick is also another term that Hollywood uses because it very neatly describes a broad group preference that can be marketed to in the way that other products and services are. Those who do demographic analysis for advertising purposes like to slice the population of Americans in specific categories that have clever or catchy names and acronyms; YUPPIE or Young Urban Professional being the most well known example. But I like to think that my interest in movies is genuinely eclectic and not easily categorized. I might prefer action movies over romantic comedies but I want my car crashes and explosions to be sensitive and emotive!