Studio: Tcfhe/mgm Release Date: 09/01/2009 Run time: 194 minutesBased on Chester Himes’s novel, this film marked actor-writer Ossie Davis’s directing debut. Godfrey Cambridge and Raymond St. Jacques play Himes’s volatile police detectives, Gravedigger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson, who are on the trail of white men who pulled an armed stickup at a Back to Africa rally in Harlem. The money belongs to the poor people who paid for a chance to return to the motherland–but was it really a stickup? Or is the flashy preacher at the center of the Back to Africa movement (Calvin Lockhart) involved in a scam to rip off his own people? The plot drags; the best part of the film are the performances (as well as spotting cameos by such actors as the then-unknown Cleavon Little) and the on-location shooting in parts of New York where a camera had rarely ventured previously. Redd Foxx shows up in a small part as a ragpicker that led to his role in TV’s Sanford and Son. –Marshall Fine
Buy “Soul Cinema Double Feature: Cotton Comes to Harlem and Hell up in Harlem” For Only $8.75
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March 11, 2010
#1
Another movie in which Calvin Lockhart is momentarily shirt-less. A hundred, thousand, million stars!
March 11, 2010
#2
this film has so much going on that it’s like being at a tennis match.very well acted and funny as hell.
March 11, 2010
#3
a little slow in delived but an excellent movie.
March 11, 2010
#4
This refers to the double feature version containing both “Cotton Comes to Harlem” and “Hell Up in Harlem”.
I purchased the older DVD with just “Cotton Comes to Harlem” some years ago but was looking for a replacement with the correct aspect ratio, which is 1.85:1 per IMDb. From the description of this product, both here and elsewhere, it appeared to me that both films were available in both 1.33:1 and 1.85:1, a not uncommon occurrence.
Unfortunately, this is not correct: the package labling clearly states that “Cotton Comes to Harlem” is 1.33:1 and “Hell Up in Harlem” is 1.85:1.
The film itself is great. I enjoyed when I read the book, when I saw the film at the time it came out, and I enjoy it every time I see it even in P&S.
I just wish the product description had been more precise.
March 11, 2010
#5
I have been seeing this film since I was a kid and to be honest, with each film, I learn a little bit more about the film that I did before. Anyway, you see this fancy car followed by a gold armored truck going throughout Harlem; To me, that is suspect from the get go, but alright. Let’s see how this go; The movie starts with this man coming out of this fancy car in a cape(Calvin Lockhart) with followers, and folks are on the car trying to see the Reverend O’Malley. He gets on a platform and puts on this big speech about being tired of whitey and going back to Africa and asking folk to sign up for the ship($100 minimum) and you should see the folks running up to the table to buy shares on this ship. Redd Foxx come up and has $20 tops and after some consideration from the Reverend, he is given a certificate. Then soon after, whitey comes up and asks that the Reverend go downtown(I’m smelling a rat, but ok) then as soon as he get the people to calm down, a group of folks jump out a car and starts shooting up the place and surprise, take the money these people put down for this ship. And from then, it’s a high speed chase for two cops(Godrey Cambridge and Raymond St Jacques) to get to the heart of the matter.