Review: The Black 6

A young black man and his white lover are making out on a football field one night when a group of white supremacist bikers (including the white girl’s own brother!) fatally beat the man to death. Gene Washington stars as the dead man’s brother, who along with five of his fellow Vietnam veterans (who like Washington are played by ex-footballers) decide to mount up on motorcycles and get some vengeance. Well, after Washington finds out who actually did the deed. And uh, after he goes home and reconnects with his family and former lover (Rosalind Miles) who is now a hooker. Then it’s time to get some revenge. After some more riding at least. Sigh.

 

More biker movie than blaxploitation, this 1973 film from director Matt Cimber (the underrated blaxploitation movie “Lady Cocoa”) and screenwriter Mikel Angel (ditto) never surpasses its opening scene. The scene is well-shot in darkness with the ominous sounds of engines revving, it’s only spoiled a bit by some poor acting. The rest of the film keeps up the poor acting but doesn’t have anything as good as that scene though the music score by David Moscoe (“Sordid Lives”) is solid enough. It also doesn’t help that the title is disingenuous, as this is 80% Gene Washington, the other five characters are barely in the film. The villains are probably in the film even less and aren’t fleshed out at all.

 

The main cast members were apparently unhappy with the script and I can see why. The gimmicky casting of ex-gridiron players as the leads doesn’t come off too badly (Gene Washington has a bit of charisma), and I like that each of them is introduced by on-screen titles showing what team they played for. However, it’s clear that they’re not very good actors and the only way to pull this gimmick off would’ve been to hire the likes of Bernie Casey, Jim Brown, Carl Weathers, and Fred Williamson – all ex-footballers with a lot more presence and acting ability than these guys. Rosalind Miles is quite good as prostitute Ceal, so much so that she seems to have come in from a different, better film. Sadly, the acting from the rest of the cast is pretty abysmal and I really think Cimber should’ve cast better actors around the six to cover for any deficiencies. I get that this is low-budget, but you didn’t have to make the movie at all, so make the best of it.

 

What really kills this film is that the pacing is slower than the motorcycle riding. There’s zero urgency here. Also, a source of unintentional amusement here comes when you notice that for some scenes there’s very clearly only a Black 5. ‘Mean’ Joe Greene is there for close-ups but in a lot of the wider riding shots I’m almost certain he’s not there. Hilarious. Where’d you go, Joe? It doesn’t help that the racist bikers look like members of Toto, not exactly the toughest-looking guys around. The silly final fight is hardly “The Outsiders” or “They Live” either.

 

Mediocre biker movie with an inexperienced cast, an agonisingly slow pace, and a pretty good music score. There’s not much to see here.

 

Rating: C