The Legend of Nigger Charley (1972) review

 

THE LEGEND OF NIGGER CHARLEY (onscreen title: THE LEGEND OF BLACK CHARLEY) 1972

Fred Williamson (Nigger Charley), D’Urville Martin (Toby), Don Pedro Colley (Joshua), Thomas Anderson (Shadow), John Ryan (Houston), Tom Pemberton (Willie), Tricia O’Neil (Sarah Lyons), Jerry Gatlin (Sheriff Rhinehart), Gertrude Jeannette (Theo), Keith Prentice (Niles Fowler), Alan Gifford (Hill Carter), Doug Rowe (Dewey Lyons), Marcia McBroom (Leda), Joe Santos (Reverend Jarvis Kessler)

Directed by Martin Goldman 

The Short Version: Former football star Fred Williamson tackles his first leading role in the remarkable, if rough around the edges, THE LEGEND OF NIGGER CHARLEY. It wasn’t the first black western, but certainly the most controversial and influential. Director Martin Goldman’s movie wants to be more than exploitation but it never rises above being anything more than escapist entertainment. Peppered with some great lines, a real camaraderie between the actors, an out of place soundtrack (save for the fitting ‘In the Eyes of God’ by rock n roll hall of famer Lloyd Price), and an episodic narrative, Charley’s LEGEND is finally available again after 40 years of  obscurity.

 

The dying master Hill Carter, at the behest of his housekeeper Theo, promises the freedom of her adopted son, Charley, a blacksmith slave living on his Virginia plantation. The evil Houston, who’s biding time till Carter’s death to take control of his plantation, tears up the letter of Charley’s freedom. In a rage, Charley kills Houston and becomes a runaway slave along with his friends Toby and Joshua. Pursued by slave wrangler Niles Fowler, Charley and his friends eventually kill their pursuers in a fierce gun battle. Earning a reputation as a heroic gunfighter, Charley and his now five-man band are recruited to protect a family from a psychotic preacher and his bandit gang.

 

Television Director Martin Goldman had a minor career in the movie business and this once hard to see blaxploitation western was the only film he was known for. THE LEGEND OF NIGGER CHARLEY (1972) is a film that should be better known rather than the little seen obscurity it’s been for decades. Despite this, it was a sizable hit back in 1972 and helped propel its star, Fred Williamson, into a long-lasting action film career. 

Generally, when many discuss  blaxploitation, it encompasses any films with multiple or entirely black leading stars and cast—black exploitation cinema. The word “exploitation” denotes films that exploit certain filmic elements to outrageous levels to sell a product. Where a major studio picture may have violent content, a low budget picture that can’t compete monetarily will do so by making violent content the emphasis of the film. This tends to include heavy doses of nudity and or sex, or explicit language designed to elicit an emotional response in viewers.

The term “blaxploitation”  is somewhat deceptive since a number of these films that were geared towards black audiences and were given this label are serious motion pictures with more of a story to tell than scenes of brutal violence at regular intervals. THE LEGEND OF NIGGER CHARLEY (1972) wants to do both and doesn’t entirely succeed at being either purely exploitation or a serious western. The sequel, THE SOUL OF NIGGER CHARLEY (1973), is quite different in this respect. That film is also getting a new, updated review from the one linked above.

LEGEND is rated PG, in spite of its subject matter. Occasionally violent, there’s no nudity (other than a mild sex scene) but it does have an abundance of  incendiary language that’s tossed around so regularly, it’s apparent what co-writers Martin Goldman and Larry G. Spangler were trying to do. Hurling epithets is a cheap method to rile up an audience against a film’s antagonists, but effective nonetheless.

 

 

The script is episodic, feeling like a three-chapter arc. Part one is Charley gaining his freedom; part two is Charley and his friends being tracked down to a small town by a posse of slave hunters; and part three is Charley being hired to help protect a passive couple from a mad preacher and his gang. It's an action-oriented script that contains an occasional bit of humor. One comedic moment involves a run-in with a group of Indians that may have inspired Mel Brooks for a similar scene in BLAZING SADDLES (1974). In it, the young Indians surround Charley and his two friends. Curious of their darker skin, one of the Indians rubs Charley's face. Charley then returns the favor by brushing his hand against the Indian's face, showing him that neither color has rubbed off. 

 

The writers also tried to create compelling and or interesting protagonist characters that went beyond the standard of the genre. Focusing solely on Williamson would’ve been adequate, but they include two additional characters (and a few supporting ones) for Charley to interact with. There's a genuine rapport between Charley, Toby and Joshua.

 

 

Don Pedro Colley is perfect as the kindly, soft-spoken Joshua. He'll forever be remembered for his role as Ongaro, a mutant human in BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES (1970) who utters the classic line, "We are a peaceful people. We don't kill our enemies. We get our enemies to kill each other". He appeared with Williamson again in 1972 in BLACK CAESAR.

D'Urville Martin was a natural at playing good-natured sidekicks. He had several small roles in mainstream Hollywood pictures before black-themed movies gave him the opportunity for much larger parts. Like Don Pedro, Martin featured in BLACK CAESAR as well. A regular actor in The Hammer's films, he co-starred with Williamson again in 1975s BOSS NIGGER, another western that could be viewed as a loose third chapter in the NIGGER CHARLEY saga even though Williamson and Martin aren't playing the same characters. Martin would later show he could both direct a movie and play its main villain in the iconic DOLEMITE (1975) starring Rudy Ray Moore.

Rounding out Charley's band of gunfighters...

 

 

Willie, a 16-year old gunslinger (played by Tom Pemberton) who prefers the showy technique of fanning his gun, joins Charley, who quickly takes to the young boy in a father and son way. Unfortunately, this plot point is only explored just enough to get the message across. Then there's the worldly Shadow (played by Thomas Anderson), who has many stories to tell of his exploits and personal slaving--highlighting his winning a Comanche woman in a card game... only to turn around and sell her for a drumstick.

 

 

John P. Ryan is the wild-eyed and vicious slave master Houston. He's way over the top with his relentless obscenities hurled at Charley and his treatment of others, particularly Charley's girlfriend Leda. Most genre fans know him from Larry Cohen's IT'S ALIVE (1974) and IT LIVES AGAIN (1978). He was a regular in Cannon Films like AVENGING FORCE (1986), DEATH WISH 4: THE CRACKDOWN (1987), and DELTA FORCE 2: THE COLOMBIAN CONNECTION (1990). He was also memorable as a robot teacher in Terminator mode in CLASS OF 1999 (1990).

 

The beautiful Tricia O'Neill made her film debut here, having been a stage actress prior. She isn't given much to do, looking dour the entire time, never smiling. Her expression tells her story without having to utter much dialog. She showed off her lovely figure in THE GUMBALL RALLY (1976) and had the lead role in the underrated PIRANHA 2: THE SPAWNING (1981) directed by James Cameron. She worked with Cameron again in a minor appearance in TITANIC (1997).

LEGEND begins in 1820 with simulated B/W footage shot as if we’re watching a documentary. We see an African tribe taking members of an enemy tribe and selling them as slaves to foreigners to be sold in the Americas, the Middle East and European territories. This opening doesn’t audibly explain the historical facets of the slave trade, it’s simply giving us the bare minimum to move the plot along. 

One of the captives is a pregnant woman who gives birth on her way to the ship she’s being taken away on. The baby boy is the child who will grow up to be the runaway slave of the film’s title.

 

And now for the man himself... 

As Charley, Fred Williamson is, like the film he's starring in, rough around the edges. It being his first lead role, it wasn’t long before The Hammer was wearing action hero parts as comfortably as an old pair of shoes. He was never a great actor but the roles he played didn’t require he be; charisma sold the man and Williamson has no shortage of that. The script does offer multiple occasions for Williamson to emote, and he puts in a good effort. Regardless of what many critics would say, he does a better job in these moments than you'd expect of an new action star in the making.

Black westerns didn't begin with LEGEND, but went as far back as the 1920s. Bill Pickett, for example, was a black cowboy, rodeo star and actor who starred in movies like 1921s CRIMSON SKULL. Pickett’s father was a former slave as was the woman Pickett would marry in 1890. He owned his own horse-breaking and cattle company, too. His life is indeed worth bringing to the big screen.

 

Then there’s HARLEM ON THE PRAIRIE from 1937, the first western with an all black cast starring Herb Jeffries (who had an intriguing life all his own that's worth being made into a movie). Then there’s Woody Strode, who started in SERGEANT RUTLEDGE in 1960. Sydney Poitier costarred with James Garner in DUEL AT DIABLO (1966). And also in 1972, released weeks before Williamson’s LEGEND, was BUCK AND THE PREACHER starring Sydney Poitier (who also directed) and Harry Belafonte. With the success of Williamson's western, Paramount Pictures would then distribute the bizarre, independently produced CHARLEY ONE-EYE in 1973 starring SHAFT himself, Richard Roundtree.

What’s unique about NIGGER CHARLEY and its sequel is that Williamson’s hero isn’t written as a typically linear protagonist. He’s more like a real human being with as many flaws as ideals. When he shows interest in going back to help the poor rancher, Toby questions if he's doing it for the purposes of justice or to bed down with the man's half-breed wife. In a later scene after the group return to help Dewey Lyons against Jarvis, a villainous preacher and his gang, the wife, Sarah, asks Charley why he came back. He says he's not sure if he did it for the right reasons. You normally wouldn't get this kind of thing in an action picture; it’s not the behavior of what defines a typical good guy.

 

It’s a shame this series didn't have more sequels, as there are additional historical stories relevant to the subject matter that could've expanded on the character of Charley. For example, millions of slaves sold to the Arabs were then sold to the Chinese—who likewise enslaved their own people as other countries did in those times. A potential sequel could’ve seen Charley set sail for China to free slaves there; or in India or some other Asian country.

 

The film’s title was controversial in its day and, as Fred Williamson gambled, key to the picture's success and ability to attract attention. That doesn’t mean that some territories didn’t get nervous about promoting the movie with its eyebrow-raising title. In certain areas, the movie was advertised as “The legend of Charley” or “The Legend of Black Charley”. The altered title on this print is the latter moniker. If you want to read our old review from 2010 to compare images then and now, that bootleg version retains the film's original title and can be read HERE.

 

The most jarring thing about the film is its soundtrack by music producer John Bennings. It doesn't sound anything like a western film score; replacing traditional sweeping cues of either the American or Italian spectrum, it settles for a funky sound indigenous to the black action genre. The cues aren't bad, just that they feel out of place in a western movie. However, two songs feel perfectly aligned with the film--those being 'In the Eyes of God'  that opens the film and the main title song that closes it, 'The Legend of Nigger Charley', both of which bear the vocal excellence of Rock n' Roll Hall of Famer Lloyd Price.

Seeing the film in a restored version allows for a better appreciation of the filmmakers efforts. It's a slightly above-average film in the genre, hampered by some wobbly scenes that go on too long--possibly due to the television roots of director Goldman. Charley's inaugural exploits were successful enough to ensure more black westerns--and even the bigger budgeted, more controversial Paramount production, MANDINGO (1975). Charley's second adventure is an improvement; but the LEGEND is a good start, as well as a satisfying beginning to the film career of Fred Williamson.

This review is representative of the Imprint Blaxploitation 4-disc bluray box set paired with THE SOUL OF NIGGER CHARLEY (1973), SUPERFLY TNT (1973) and DETROIT 9000 (1973). Specs and extras: 1080p 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen presentation from a new 4K restoration; audio commentary by filmmaker/critic Mike Sargent; interview with Josiah Howard, author of Blaxploitation Cinema; radio spot; Running time: 01:39:44