Okay, so this movie is called a Black Enforcer's on Tubi.
But everywhere else either calls it 'The Black Gestapo' or gives it some other ridiculous name.
Where Black Enforcer's came from is beyond me.
But it's the easiest version to find and it's free.
And I'd recommend that if you've never heard of this movie before or have no idea that is production and or story then you should watch it without any prior knowledge.
Because it's strange baffling and really surprised the hell out of me.
Dig this. A group of men have formed a local militia to keep the neighbourhood of Watts (and possible other areas) safe from criminal activities and racketeering.
They're actually financed by the Governor of California.
(Though you only learn about that later on.)
They're supposed to bring Law and Order to a place where the police simply can't (or most likely refuse to).
But problems are arising as criminals are becoming more brazened and starting to attack the black militia with little to no care. Beating up their men, extorting local businesses and molesting women.
This pushes the local leader of the militia to committing an extreme action by allowing one of his underlings (a colonel) to create his own private task force; designated with protecting and later on eliminating the criminal threats.
At first it's a pretty typical gangster movie. white Mobsters versus a black street gang. But there's really not much difference between them and any other group of thugs out there except that they're trying to actually keep some peace in their neighbourhood. So I guess they're kind of like a military Robin Hood Type except they're fighting other hoods.
But the interesting part starts to take effect when you noticed that the "people's army'' starting to imitate the white Mafia and committing the exact same crimes the whites were doing once they're pushed out*.
But then the army take it a step further.
They start dressing in black uniforms, wearing skulls on their head and before you know it; they've turned into their own version of the Nazi SS.
I was honestly stunned by this turn out.
As I said before I had no idea what the movie was about. So the Nazi imagery was a real shock.
It's kind of hinted at earlier in the film when you have this strange cutaway to Nazi soldiers marching down the street at the very beginning of the movie and I remember thinking even before that that the flag was particularly eye-catching, given that it was a red backdrop for a big white circle and a Black Fist. Which looked to be imitating the old Nazi standard.
But I still wasn't expecting the movie to literally turn into black Schutzstaffel officers roaming the streets, committing extortion crimes and leading into illusions of grandeur and a possible black superiority complex.
The movie doesn't really play with any of those themes. in fact it doesn't play with any themes.
You get the bare-bones amount of information.
Here's the People's Army.
Here they are fighting mobsters, here they are dividing and fighting each other. Before the main character breaks off on his own and goes mad men Rambo on the entire Battalion of black shirt African Americans.
And in a way I kind of miss that about some movies.
If this movie was made today it would be 3 hours long with it's a backstory explaining everything. The ideological approaches of the more military-minded members and a strange obsession with fascism. The exploitation of the community, why the police aren't around, how the governor got involved with supplying a militia with funds to keep the local community ''safe''.
This movie doesn't care about any of that. It just wants to have some crazy imagery in a bunch of fighting action.
And sometimes that's all you need.
Although with that said, I'd pay to watch a movie about beaten-down frustrated young black men turning to a form of absolute authoritarianism that ultimately turns him into their worst fear and the Very people they sought to escape in the first place.
I'm sure something like that exists out there but I haven't seen anything this blatant.
It's not often a blaxploitation movie conjures up images of ''Triumph of the will''.
I do wonder if this film was trying to say something about the Black Panther Movement or some weird division of said movement. Maybe it's pure coincidence or it's just bad ignorance on the filmmakers card. Truth is I'll probably never know unless there's some documented info out there.
*And when I say pushed out I mean completely. The white Mobsters make up a large amount of screen presence in the first half of the movie. They might get more time than the black characters. But then they just disappear altogether and they never come back.
One of them is castrated but otherwise they all seem to be fine. They're just out of the picture now and a different movie starts up altogether.
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