Okay, say you're throwing a party...yeah, one of those things. Suspend disbelief for a second. Some of your friends are in the mood for Enter the Dragon. Some of your other friends are in the mood for Shaft. Well, I've got a movie to settle this version of the less-filling/tastes-great dispute, it's called Black Belt Jones. It's one of the two best reasons not to burn Robert Clouse alive, and it's the best damn kung-fu blaxploitation film ever.

It stars Jim Kelly, kung-fu pimp with a short lifespan from Enter the Dragon, as Jones, who also answers to Belt. No bloody idea why. Here he's being a bad motherfucker and kicking a lot of cracka' ass like only he can.

The movie also stars Scatman Crothers as Papa Byrd, who taught all his kids kung-fu and has them run the classes at the community center...wait. If Scatman knows kung-fu, why couldn't he dodge that ax? Ah well...movie also stars Gloria Hendry, the black girl in Fanny's gang of friends in La Dolce Vita and also the CIA agent from Live and Let Die, as Sidney, Papa Byrd's only daughter amongst his squadron of sons. The cast also includes future tv stars Marla Gibbs and Ted Lange (Isaac as a Black Panther!#%) in uncredited roles.

The plot is invisible if you're not sober but it doesn't matter. If you are sober and you demand a plot, well here you go:

The Mob wants to buy up the some land for shady purposes. Papa Byrd's school is on the land. Papa Byrd isn't planning on moving. He calls on Black Belt Jones, who's currently into guarding South American Diplomats from Faceless Terrorists. So around the same time the Mob sends in the local thug, Pinky, who likes to pretend he's Rudy Ray Moore. He already has issues with Papa Byrd, namely a gambling debt that seems to grow a 0 every time they run into each other. He tries to use that to his advantage, but Papa Byrd won't budge. So he tries to use the thugs... twice... and fails twice. Then he comes up with the idea of kidnapping Papa Byrd. But they manage to screw that up by killing him before he can give the property over to them.

So Papa's daughter Sydney comes to town, and they try to strong-arm her into selling the land that's hers now, but to their surprise, she kicks the crap out of them. She teams up with Jones both strategically and romantically (you know he had to get a girl!#%), and when she learns the gravity of the situation, she helps set plans in motion, starting with pinning a cash reclamation from the mob on Pinky's thugs, and influencing an A-Team gimmick in the process (the old photo over the security camera trick). The end has Pinky, his thugs, and the mob reteaming once again to take a world-class ass-beating by Sydney and Jones in an overflooded car wash.

This movie isn't only silly and mad fun beyond anything else, it's also mad quotable beyond anything else. Right from the start, there's the insanely funny spin on Bruce Lee's trademark yell. Of course there's Pinky's rhyme too:

Choose money over honey? Shiiiiit. Man, you can pull out my groin, just gimme that coin! Man, I'd rather be dead than not have any bread! Pinky's mama didn't raise no fool!

Many other great quotes came from Pinky too, such as "This is do not disturb...DIG!" and his catchphrase "I'm from New Orleans!" Then there's Sydney, who resorts to telling her opponents they're gonna look like "sick faggots". And Jones himself gets in the best ones. The classic "Batman, motherfucker!" reponse to Pinky's questioning who hit him. And his come-on to Sydney: "I'm gonna make you sweat... one way... and then the other."

Finally his rallying chant for celebration for a successful diversion...not a victory, but a diversion...get this:

"Hey, let's go to McDonalds!"

And the students just go completely wild too. This isn't a movie to be analyzed. It's the greatest insane movie of its kind to be made in America. And I rather dig it.

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