I’ve watched the film Coffy over the weekend at Anthology Film Archives. It is a 35mm film written and directed in 1973 by Jack Hill and starring Pam Grier as the female protagonist. The genre of this film is Blaxploitation which is an ethnic subgenre of film in the 70s targeted for an urban black audience. Pam Grier played Coffy who was a nurse seeking revenge on drug dealers who got her young sister addicted. In the beginning of the scene, she lured a drug dealer using her sexuality to his house and killed him. After returning to the operation room at the hospital as a nurse, she had to leave the job because her hands were shaky. What also triggered her to go on a hunt and kill drug dealers was the scene when two men broke into her police officer friend Carter’s house while he and Coffy were catching up.

She then targeted King George who was a pimp at a prostitution business and wanted to work as a prostitute. She was at a party with other prostitute women who were jealous that she got the attention of George and spilled food on her purposely. Coffy went back and stuck sharp pins in her hair and when she went back, she got her revenge on the women and started fighting all of them alone. One of the prostitutes actually pulled Coffy’s hair and her hands bled everywhere.

The leader of a mob, Vitroni wanted Coffy to stay with him for a night. He was a racist white man who spit on her and called her names. She came prepared with a hidden gun in her teddy bear but was knocked away by Vitroni’s associates. Coffy told them King George sent her to kill Vitroni. The mob kidnapped Coffy and locked her in a room then killed King George by dragging him on a rope while driving their car on the streets.

Coffy again used her charm, sexuality and vigilance and escaped from the kidnap. She killed Vitroni and his associates then her boyfriend Brunswick, who she saw at Vitroni’s mob meeting and found out he was a part of it. She went to Brunswick’s place and when he begged for a second chance, a woman yelled upstairs for him to come back to bed. She fired her gun at him.

This film had couple of interesting experimental shots although not completely an experimental film. Some shots were filmed through a fish tank with an unusual, different perspective.

-Siyu Liu