#1095: PEEBLES, Melvin Van: Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971)
PEEBLES, Melvin Van (United States)
A 2003 fictional feature film based on Van Peebles’s diaries from the making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, directed by and starring Mario Van Peebles, with commentary by father and son.
The Story Behind Baadasssss!: The Birth of Black Cinema
Melvin Van Peebles: The Real Deal
Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971)
Spine #1095
Blu-ray
Blu-ray
A landmark of Black and American independent cinema that would send shock waves through the culture, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song was Melvin Van Peebles’s second feature film, after he walked away from a contract with Columbia in order to make his next film on his own terms. Acting as producer, director, writer, composer, editor, and star, Van Peebles created the prototype for what Hollywood would eventually co-opt and make into the blaxploitation hero: a taciturn, perpetually blank-faced performer in a sex show, who, when he’s pushed too far by a pair of racist cops looking to frame him for a crime he didn’t commit, goes on the run through a lawless underground of bikers, revolutionaries, sex workers, and hippies in a kill-or-be-killed quest for liberation from white oppression. Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song’s incendiary politics are matched by Van Peebles’s revolutionary style, in which jagged jump cuts, kaleidoscopic superimpositions, and psychedelic sound design come together in a sustained howl of rage and defiance.
97 minutes
Color
Color
Monaural
1:85:1 aspect ratio
1:85:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2021
Director/Writer
Film Rating (0-60):
The Booklet
Fifty-six page booklet featuring essays by film scholars Racquel J. Gates, Allyson Nadia Field, Michael B. Gillespie, and Lisa B. Thompson.
Commentary
From 1997 by Van Peebles.
Introduction
By Van Peebles from 1997.
Conversation 1
Between Mario Van Peebles and film critic Elvis Mitchell.
Interview
From 1971 with Van Peebles on Detroit Tubeworks.
Episode
Of Black Journal from 1971 featuring Van Peebles and critics Clayton Riley, Francis Ward, and A. Peter Bailey.
Conversation 2
Between scholars Gerald R. Butters Jr., Novotny Lawrence, and Amy Abugo Ongiri.
Trailer
Excerpts
From a 2004 interview with Van Peebles for the Directors Guild of America Visual History Program.
Baadasssss!60
The ExtrasThe Booklet
Fifty-six page booklet featuring essays by film scholars Racquel J. Gates, Allyson Nadia Field, Michael B. Gillespie, and Lisa B. Thompson.
Commentary
From 1997 by Van Peebles.
Introduction
By Van Peebles from 1997.
Conversation 1
Between Mario Van Peebles and film critic Elvis Mitchell.
Interview
From 1971 with Van Peebles on Detroit Tubeworks.
Episode
Of Black Journal from 1971 featuring Van Peebles and critics Clayton Riley, Francis Ward, and A. Peter Bailey.
Conversation 2
Between scholars Gerald R. Butters Jr., Novotny Lawrence, and Amy Abugo Ongiri.
Trailer
Excerpts
From a 2004 interview with Van Peebles for the Directors Guild of America Visual History Program.
A 2003 fictional feature film based on Van Peebles’s diaries from the making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, directed by and starring Mario Van Peebles, with commentary by father and son.
A 2004 featurette on the making of Baadasssss!
A 2002 interview with the director on the making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.
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