Foxy Brown
The Devil Says
See It
Pam Grier is back in this near-sequel to her hit Coffy as Foxy Brown, the female blaxploitation icon. She's as hot as ever (Grier that is), and is even more efficient at kicking-butt and taking names. The tone is a bit darker this time around, not that it was all that cheery before.
Foxy Brown was conceived as the
return of nurse-turned-avenger Coffy, but at the last minute the
executives at AIP decided they didn't want a sequel, so the lead
character's name was changed, but not much else. Foxy is a
strong woman surrounded by black drug pushers and corrupt white
officials. Her boyfriend is a DEA agent who's been given a new
face. Foxy's set to run off with him when her loser brother
figures out who the guy must be and sells the information to the
local mob boss, a strange woman with a submissive boy toy and a
handy brothel. When her love is shot, Foxy goes for vengeance.
Naturally, she joins the mob boss's stable of whores where she
feels she can do the most damage. 
Yup, it's pretty much the same
plot as in Coffy (and I can't help
but compare the two).
While the story is recycled (it's not as if it was original the year before), Foxy Brown is a stronger movie than it's predecessor. The pace is better, with fewer dragging scenes, and the villains are much more entertaining. In Coffy, the bad guys were just racist creeps; here they are disturbed weirdoes with sexual power issues. Foxy is also a better version of the tough, black woman, dropping the insecurities to become a mythic figure. She's real in the same way James Bond is. The dialog has also improved, with far fewer "babys." You should keep in mind that "improved" does not mean that it's good, just less painful.
The violence has also been ratcheted up. Foxy's happy to
shoot people or hit them in the face with a bottle, but why do
that when you can chop them up with an airplane propeller
or cut off their genitals? When she's raped, tortured, and
drugged, you don't feel sorry for her. 
You feel sorry for her
attackers because there's no question that very bad things are
going to happen to them. Very, very bad things. Ah, Foxy is my
kind of woman.
Where Foxy Brown is less impressive is in the skin department. There are a few bare breasts from no-name white chicks and Pam Grier pops out of her top now and again, but in a movie with this much violence, the toned down flesh is a disappointment.
Sins (What does this mean?)
| Pride | Foxy is pretty sure of herself, and that's sexy as Hell. |
| Sloth | Nada. |
| Avarice | Nada. |
| Gluttony | Nada. |
| Aesthetics | Nada. |
| Surrogate Cruelty | Killings of all kinds, including a very satisfying immolation and an even better meeting of man and propeller. On the non-lethal side, there's a lesbian bar fight, a rape, a castration, and some beatings. |
| Thought | Nada, unless you need some lessons in race relations. |
| Humor | A darker toned blaxploitation entry, it still manages to make me smile. |
| Lust | More nudity would have been nice. Random babes show their tits here and there, and Ms Grier's nipples put in several appearances. Sex scenes are brief, but they do exist, along with an off-screen rape. |
