76% (2) Let's Do It Again 110 min, PG, [Action, Comedy, Crime] [Sidney Poitier] [11 Oct 1975]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 69%, Rotten Tomatoes: 83%, External Reviews
Awards: 5 wins.
Actors: Bill Cosby, Calvin Lockhart, John Amos, Sidney Poitier
Writer: Richard Wesley (screenplay), Timothy March (story)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: Clyde Williams and Billy Foster are a couple of blue-collar workers in Atlanta who have promised to raise funds for their fraternal order, the Brothers and Sisters of Shaka. However, their method for raising the money involves travelling to New Orleans and rigging a boxing match. Using hypnotism, they turn the scrawny underdog into a super-confident fighting machine. They bet heavily on him, he wins easily, and they return to Atlanta with their money. All is fine until the gangsters conned by these two figure out what happened show up in Atlanta with a grudge. Now Williams and Foster have to rig the fight again so the gangsters can get their money back or they'll be killed. Can they do it again...?
Rotten Tomatoes: A pair of blue-collar buddies use hypnosis to turn a wimpy boxer into a champ in this crime comedy, which reunites actor/director Sidney Poitier and comedian Bill Cosby, stars of the similarly themed Uptown Saturday Night. Clyde Williams (Poitier) and Billy Foster (Cosby) want to help raise funds to sustain the Sons and Daughters of Shaka Lodge, their local community group. Given that Clyde was trained as a hypnotist while in the military, the pair decide to con mobster Biggie Smalls (Calvin Lockhart) by placing a high-stakes bet on a boxing match and then using hocus-pocus to transform skinny underdog Bootney Farnsworth (Jimmie Walker) into a bruiser. When Biggie finds out about their ruse, he and his thugs move in to reclaim their money, setting the stage for further laughs and sleight-of-hand. With a supporting cast that includes Denise Nicholas and Lee Chamberlin as the protagonists' wives and Ossie Davis as an elder at their lodge, Let's Do It Again also reunited Good Times stars Walker and John Amos to the silver screen. Cosby and Poitier would return two years later with A Piece of the Action, though Lockhart, another veteran of Uptown Saturday Night, would sit out the final team-up. Hip-hop fans will note that Lockhart's character provided one of the aliases for slain '90s rap star Christopher Wallace, also known as the Notorious B.I.G. The soundtrack for Let's Do It Again featured Curtis Mayfield songs performed by the the Staple Singers.
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65% (1) Cotton Comes to Harlem 97 min, R, [Action, Comedy] [Ossie Davis] [27 May 1970]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 65%, External Reviews
Awards: 1 win & 1 nomination.
Actors: Calvin Lockhart, Godfrey Cambridge, Judy Pace, Raymond St. Jacques
Writer: Chester Himes (based upon the novel by), Arnold Perl (screenplay), Ossie Davis (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: Gravedigger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson are two black cops with a reputation for breaking the odd head. Both are annoyed at the success of the Reverend Deke O'Mailey who is selling trips back to Africa to the poor on the installment plan. When his truck is hijacked and a bale of cotton stuffed with money is lost in the chase, Harlem is turned upside down by Gravedigger and Coffin Ed, the Reverend, and the hijackers. Much of the humor is urban black, which was unusual in 1970.
Rotten Tomatoes: Ossie Davis makes his directorial debut a smashing success in the action crime comedy Cotton Comes To Harlem. Coffin Ed Johnson (Raymond St. Jacques) and Grave Digger Jones (Godfrey Cambridge) are neighborhood plainclothes cops who keep tabs on the residents and keep a lid on trouble. The Reverend Deke O'Malley (Calvin Lockhart) is a crooked, money-laundering preacher under suspicion by the detectives. Over $87,000 in cash is hidden in a bale of cotton, money Deke has bilked from the trusting community. Redd Foxx and Cleavon Little also appear in this popular feature that spawned future sequels of lesser quality.
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62% (1) Leo the Last 104 min, R, [Drama, Comedy] [John Boorman] [01 Mar 1970]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 62%, External Reviews
Awards: 1 win & 1 nomination.
Actors: Billie Whitelaw, Calvin Lockhart, Glenna Forster-Jones, Marcello Mastroianni
Writer: William Stair (screenplay), John Boorman (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: UK
Plot: Prince Leo, last in the line of rulers of a long-deposed monarchy on continental Europe and jaded with the frenetic search for kicks with the European jet-set, returns to his father's London town house for rest. With him are social-climber Margaret, to whom he is engaged, and Laszlo, who is planning a counter revolution which will restore Leo to the kingship of the monarchy. Leo is shocked to discover the one exclusive neighborhood has degenerated into a ghetto inhabited mainly by poor blacks on the brink of desperation. His nearest neighbors are the Mardi family and their beautiful daughter, Salambo, who catches his eye as does her boy friend the procurer Roscoe. Using the excuse of watching birds he watches them closely through field glasses with the coolness and detachment of a scientist watching insects under a magnifying glass. When Salambo is forced to become a whore in order to keep her family together, Leo, despite the pleadings of Margaret and Laszlo who has just about finished the steps toward the restoration, does something of which he always though himself incapable.
Rotten Tomatoes: Prince Leo (Marcello Mastroianni) is the exiled ruler from an unnamed country living on the edge of a London ghetto with his harridan mistress Margaret (Billie Whitelaw). While viewing birds through his telescope, he witnesses the struggles of his black neighbors to survive their harsh urban environment. When Salambo (Glenna Forster Jones) is forced into prostitution by Jasper (Keefe West), the prince decides to take action. He rescues the woman after she is raped and makes her his ward and protectorate. When the royal guards invade the neighborhood, Leo and a makeshift troop of residents repel the advance with fireworks and homemade explosives. The film is based on the George Tabori play "The Prince" and deals with class struggles of the poor against the haughty royals. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi
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59% (1) Halls of Anger 96 min, R, [Drama] [Paul Bogart] [28 Dec 1970]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 59%, External Reviews
Actors: Calvin Lockhart, James A. Watson Jr., Janet MacLachlan, Jeff Bridges
Writer: John Herman Shaner, Al Ramrus
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: USA
Plot: An all-black inner city school has to become an integrated school. Few dozen white kids are transfered there, but the black students are aggressively opposed to this. The school then approaches a tough black teacher for help.
Rotten Tomatoes: White students are bussed into an all black school in this powerful drama. Quincy Davis (Calvin Lockhart) is the dedicated black English teacher who leaves an all white school to teach in the inner city. Lloyd Wilkerson (John McLiam) is the disciplinary principal who manages the institution like a prison. He tells Quincy point blank that his main job is to keep the peace in a potentially explosive situation. Sherry (Patricia Stich) is stripped in the locker room while Douglas (Jeff Bridges) is repeatedly beaten up but refuses to give up or give in to the mob. The white minorities are constantly harassed by the mob lead by the militant J.T. Watson (James A. Watson Jr.). Lerone (Dewayne Jesse) is helped with his reading by Lloyd, and improves his skills by reading Lady Chatterly's Lover. The after-school reading program soon becomes popular to the students, who find new appreciation for literary pursuits. Watch for an early appearance from Rob Reiner, later to achieve sitcom stardom as Meathead on All in the Family and become one of Hollywood's best directors.
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59% (1) Joanna 108 min, R, [Comedy, Drama, Musical] [Michael Sarne] [24 Nov 1968]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 59%, External Reviews
Actors: Calvin Lockhart, Christian Doermer, Donald Sutherland, Geneviève Waïte
Writer: Michael Sarne (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: English Country: UK
Plot: Joanna Sorrin, a whimsical and fanciful country girl, goes to London to follow a fashion design course. She comes into contact with the capital's young jet set and becomes the mistress of Gordon, the black owner of a night club. Unfortunately her lover happens to kill a man and is sent to jail. As she is pregnant from Gordon, Joanna returns to her parents'home. But the young woman has not yet said her last word. She WILL be back in Swingin' London !
Rotten Tomatoes: Forgotten 20th Century Fox starlet Geneviève Waïte and forgotten "trendy" director Michael Sarne teamed for the eminently forgettable Joanna. Waïte stars as the title character, a swinging London art student who uses up men like other people use Kleenex. Her carefree lifestyle comes to an end when she is impregnated by Gordon (Calvin Lockhart) -- one of the first black-white relationships in a major motion picture. Joanna frequently becomes a musical, notably in the final sequence, in which the heroine joins in a chorus with the entire cast and production crew Donald Sutherland co-stars as one of Joanna's wealthy paramours. Director Michael Sarne went from Joanna to Myra Breckinridge, then disappeared from view. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
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58% (1) The Beast Must Die 93 min, PG, [Horror, Mystery] [Paul Annett] [01 Apr 1974]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 58%, External Reviews
Actors: Calvin Lockhart, Charles Gray, Marlene Clark, Peter Cushing
Writer: Michael Winder (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Website Language: English Country: UK
Plot: Tom Newcliffe, a rich businessman and expert hunter summons six guests to his huge country estate which he has rigged up with video cameras and a high-tech security system. He tells them and his surprised wife that they are all to stay over a weekend and that all of them will be kept on the estate during that weekend. For each guest, dead bodies have followed in their wake and the way that the dead have been murdered means that one of the guest is a werewolf and Tom has summoned his guests here to discover who it is and to hunt it down... The film has a clip at the beginning asking people in the audience to try to identify the werewolf and near the end there is a 30-second "Werewolf Break" for the audience to think over the evidence...
Rotten Tomatoes: In this little horror film, a wealthy sportsman (Calvin Lockhart) invites a house full of guests to a big-game hunt that he's devised. He's sure that one of the guests is a werewolf, and he intends to stalk it, find it, and kill it. As a film viewer, you are alerted at the outset that a mystery awaits and that clues will be unveiled that can point to the identity of the werewolf. In fact, near the conclusion, the film has inserted a 30-second interlude during which you must decide, once and for all, who the hunted beast is. This film is based upon a story by James Blish titled There Shall Be No Darkness.
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