Shaft’s Big Score! (1972)

Starring: Richard Roundtree
Grade: B-

It’s still a solid action movie, but it’s easily the worst of the Shaft franchise.

Summary

Mortician Cal Asby (Robert Kya-Hill) takes money out of the safe in his office and puts it into a brown grocery bag. He walks into a room with an empty casket and begins to lift the pillow. A worker appears, and Cal just tells him that it’s him and to go back to whatever he was doing. Once the guy leaves, Cal puts all the money into the casket. He goes into his office and looks out the window. Outside are two men parked in a car seemingly waiting for him. Cal decides to call his friend, private detective John Shaft (Roundtree). Shaft, who at the moment is secretly having sex with Cal’s sister Arna (Rosalind Miles), stops and answers the phone. After Shaft gets a confirmation from Arna that Cal doesn’t know she’s with Shaft, Shaft asks why he’s calling at 2AM. Cal is in trouble and has already sent $5,000 in advance to Shaft’s account in hopes that he will help him. He needs to be picked up immediately. He will tell Shaft the rest when he sees him. Shaft agrees to drive to him, but Cal also asks if Shaft has seen Arna because he wants to warn her. With her naked body laying across him, Shaft tells him he’ll look around. Cal tells him to relay to her to get home and to keep the doors locked until they get there. As soon as Shaft pulls up to Cal’s funeral home, the whole place explodes, killing Cal. The cops and the fire department arrive on the scene shortly after. As Shaft walks out of the destroyed building, Captain Bollin (Julius Harris) questions Shaft on what Cal told him last, but Shaft refuses to divulge any information. Cal’s partner at the funeral home in Johnny Kelly (Wally Taylor) shows up and sees the body. Bollin stops him to ask if he knows anything, but Kelly defends Cal’s character greatly. He even says Cal was planning to break ground for a childcare clinic in Harlem next month. Bollin isn’t convinced of Kelly’s sympathy, bringing up how Kelly fought Cal tooth and nail over the clinic. Kelly just stares at him before walking away. Next, Kelly goes into the destroyed building and has some firemen help him move Cal’s safe into a different room.

After the firemen leave, Kelly immediately looks into Cal’s safe. Of course, he finds that the money is gone.

The next day, we see mob boss Gus Mascola (Joseph Mascolo) and his henchman get to his building via helicopter. When they get into his condo, Mascola tells henchman Andy Pascal (Joe Santos) to relay to Jack to check the two front doors on the chopper. As he switches from suit and tie to ascot and robe, while his other henchman makes him a drink, Mascola goes and plays his clarinet. Andy tries to make a call, but Mascola gives him a stare because he’s making too much noise, so Andy goes to a different room to call Kelly. He comes back into the room to relay to Mascola that Kelly said the safe is empty. Mascola stops playing and asks Andy if he told Kelly to stop by, and Andy did. If Kelly doesn’t have the $250,000 he owes, Andy is going to take his ass out. Calm and collected, Mascola gives Kelly the benefit of the doubt and is more than willing to give him some more time. He tells Andy that it’s not just about the money. Kelly also has the key to Queens. At Cal’s funeral, Shaft spots Bumpy Jonas (Moses Gunn), the Harlem mob boss from the first movie. Bumpy’s henchman Willy (Drew Bundini Brown) is also there, along with Bollin. After the service, Shaft approaches Bumpy and Willy on why they are there, but Bumpy just talks about how they go to a lot of funerals and might even turn up at Shaft’s someday. Willy tells him it will be soon, but Shaft jokes that they won’t be invited. Once Shaft leaves, Willy asks Bumpy what they are going to do about the numbers racket, but Bumpy says Kelly is in charge now and they have enough troubles of their own. Following this, Shaft and Kelly take Arna back to her home, but they are shocked to see the inside of the house is torn apart. Brandishing his gun, Shaft looks through the upstairs while Kelly watches Arna on the ground floor. Some random guy appears on the ground floor, and Arna screams to alert Shaft. Shaft runs down to chase the guy, but Kelly gets in his way twice, with Kelly acting like he was trying to help Shaft.

The man escapes because of it, and Shaft looks at Kelly suspiciously, considering how avoidable this was. Going upstairs with Arna, Shaft asks to see the partnership papers to Cal’s funeral home.

Later, Shaft approaches Kelly privately, bringing up how Arna told him that Kelly will be handling her side of the business moving forward. Kelly questions if he has a problem with it. Shaft assures him he doesn’t, but he figures he should stick around since Kelly is probably in a state of bereavement. Together, they might be able to find out who killed Cal. Clearly, Shaft is just testing him, as Kelly’s uneasiness is obvious. Shaft goes outside, and Bollin is waiting for him. Noting how they keep finding each other at the same spots, Bollin wants Shaft to come down to the precinct to talk, so Shaft agrees. Bollin tells him to get in the car, but Shaft declines because he’d rather follow him in his own car. Upon entering the station, Bollin and Shaft stop by a cop who’s practically wrestling someone he just arrested. The man keeps on bringing up his rights, but the cop tells Bollin that the guy robbed two places and crashed into a squad car. Bollin looks at the guy and states sternly, “Fuck your rights. Go sue the city”. Shaft helps the young guy up and sarcastically tells him that the cops there are trying to rehabilitate him. The cop takes the guy away, and Bollin’s guy Cooper (Dan Hannafin) pushes Shaft forward to hurry him up. Shaft snaps at Cooper and threatens that no one is walking out of there if he does that again. All three men go into Bollin’s office, and Bollin asks Shaft what he’s into with Cal and Kelly. Shaft just says he was there for the funeral. Bollin reveals that Cal and Kelly ran a numbers racket in Queens, and he wants to know Shaft’s connection with it. Shaft doesn’t give him anything and goes to leave until Cooper grabs him by the arm. Bollin tells Cooper to get them some coffee. Shaft tells Cooper to make his black on his way out. Bollin decides to tell Shaft what he has so far. He knows Shaft was fucking Cal’s sister, how there was a bomb, and Kelly has taken over. He thinks Shaft wanted in on the numbers with Kelly and helped kill Cal.

His further “evidence” is that he saw Shaft interacting with Bumpy at the funeral, so he assumes Shaft is bringing Bumpy in on it.

Bollin tells Shaft that they knew what Cal was doing but never pursued him because he kept his illegal dealings strictly with numbers and avoided bigger things like drugs, prostitution, and loan sharking. With Kelly running things however, he suggests someone else could find their way into the business such as Bumpy or Mascola. Cooper comes back into the room with Shaft’s coffee. Instead of making it black, he put in three sugars and cream to piss him off, so Shaft just stares at him. Bollin just wants Shaft to get the word out that he doesn’t want anyone messing with the status quo. He doesn’t want the streets running rampant with drugs and whores and threatens to put Shaft in jail when he says some shit, though Shaft is quick to remind him that he’s no help to anyone in a cell. Bollin relents but tells him to keep in touch if he’s smart. Sometime after, a numbers runner for Kelly enters an apartment building and gives different people their payouts or collects for new bets. After going to a few people, Shaft pops out and holds him at gunpoint, demanding to know where Kelly is operating out of. At Kelly’s apartment, he yells at his wife Rita (Kathy Imrie) for singing to herself while he tries to light his cigarette. She asks if he’s going to hang around all day and shake, but he gets angry, retorting that he can stay there all day if he wants because he pays the rent. She doesn’t think she needs him, but Kelly calls her bluff, saying that he doesn’t see her leaving. So, Rita goes to start packing. Kelly follows, slaps her, and threatens that this was just the opener. They are interrupted by a phone call. Rita grabs the phone and hits Kelly with it, so he slaps her again and she falls on the bed. Andy is on the phone, and Mascola tells Andy to be easy on Kelly. Kelly tells Andy he needs more time. Mascola tells Andy to relay that Kelly should stop by for a chat. An annoyed Andy relays the message more aggressively, and Mascola just comments “No class” while going back to playing his clarinet. Kelly can hear the clarinet playing on the other end and is confused.

After Kelly drives off, Shaft just misses him, going up to meet Rita.

He tells Rita that if Kelly isn’t back by 5PM, he’s going to take the door off the hinges. Intrigued by Shaft, Rita opens the door. After she notes how Kelly hit her, Shaft tells her that the best thing for that is an ice pack, as he caresses her face. It doesn’t take long for Rita to invite Shaft in, adding that anyone who is an enemy of Kelly is a friend of hers. They flirt some more while Rita talks about how much she hates Kelly, so Shaft has sex with her not long after. Meanwhile, Kelly shows up to Mascola’s place, and they frisk a gun off him. He explains that he’s had the piece since he was 10 in an effort to prove how it’s not a big deal. Still, Kelly lets Mascola in on what’s going on. He knew Cal had the money in the safe. He was sure of it, as they already signed the papers because Cal was buying him out in cash. A couple of Kelly’s guys saw Cal take a shopping bag and something out of the safe and going to the funeral home. The money must have been in the bag. Mascola suggests that when he blew up the building that he could have blown up the money too, but Kelly dispels this because he got a photostatic copy of the bomb squad report. There was no money in the debris, so he figures it has to be somewhere in the funeral home. After Andy tells Kelly to get the $250,000 that he owes by tonight, Mascola tells Andy to knock it off. Nevertheless, Mascola reveals what he wants. Not only does he want the money Kelly gambled away at his craps tables, but he also wants half of Kelly’s action in Queens. Kelly doesn’t want to, especially because it’s all tied into the insurance and the funeral operation. Plus, Arna owns Cal’s share. Mascola tells Kelly that if Kelly wants his half, he is to get it from Arna because Mascola is not giving up his half. Kelly pleads with Mascola because Arna is being protected by Shaft. He won’t be able to mess with her half. Mascola asks Andy if he’s ever heard of John Shaft, and he hasn’t, so Mascola tells Kelly there is nothing to worry about.

Kelly argues that Shaft is already involved, so he can’t make a move. On Kelly’s word that Mascola will officially control 50/50 of Kelly’s wheel, Mascola offers to take out Shaft for him. Reluctantly, Kelly agrees.

Unfortunately for Mascola, he doesn’t know who he’s messing with.

My Thoughts:

With the exception of the television series, Shaft’s Big Score! is the worst Shaft production out of the entire franchise. It’s still a decent action movie and mission for the beloved character to navigate through, but it’s failure to build on its predecessor’s foundation in a significant way despite the bigger budget is a disappointment.

Something doesn’t click with Shaft’s Big Score!, and it’s hard to pinpoint exactly why. Richard Roundtree as the ultra-cool private detective getting involved in a more complicated case will always be welcomed, and the sequel does improve on developing a decent cast of characters around the protagonist to keep things interesting, with the inclusion of the slimy Johnny Kelly, asshole Captain Bollin, and oddball mafia boss Gus Mascola, though the depth of the female characters or lack thereof is only a tad better than what happened in the first movie. Even so, Bollin doesn’t do anything other than impede progress. He contributes nothing to the narrative. The character was written simply because they wanted to maintain that Shaft and the police don’t get along, and they just hired a new guy to take the role instead of bringing back anyone from the first movie. Had Charles Cioffi’s Vic Androzzi returned to play middleman, it would have helped the Bollin character a lot in giving him a different personality to bounce off of. Plus, Shaft’s rapport with Androzzi was greatly missed. In Shaft, the dimensions to Shaft’s personality are shown through conversations with Androzzi and how they talk about cases with a little bit of give-and-take. However, in Shaft’s Big Score!, Shaft doesn’t have anyone who understands him nor cares to in the police department scenes, so he keeps everything close to the vest. Since he doesn’t have anyone that he’s close to nor friends with in this sequel, it’s all about the murder case. There is no room for character depth, development, or Shaft’s humor. He doesn’t evolve as a personality. If anything, he regresses and shows less depth than before. It’s not until this sequel where it becomes evident as to why Androzzi was so important to the first movie. It’s not that he was able to be friendly enough for Shaft to let his guard down or anything, but there was a mutual respect there.

They both wanted to do the right thing, allowing for some things to be swept under the rug or revealed when the time was right. In this sequel, there’s no one Shaft can do that with, so he just doesn’t, which is why the soul is missing from this movie. Other than dealing with women, the charm of John Shaft is nearly gone when dealing with others. He has room for quips here and there like telling Willy to see a surgeon about his “condition” of his mouth being “too close to your asshole”, but he’s still too serious this time around and the excitement is gone because of it. You could argue that Cal’s death affected him, but with how quickly he goes about sleeping around and kicking ass, that’s an argument you’d lose. The amusing bits that helped the Shaft character in the first movie was instead spread around to the supporting characters like Mascola. Sadly, it never felt right. This was a crucial element to the protagonist’s personality and lessening it to this degree hurt the entertainment value of the movie as a whole. He needed to have more fun, and the movie needed to have more fun. Without it, the fire that started with the first Shaft is gone. This sequel lost what made the first one feel special. It was too smooth of a production. Aesthetically, it looked nicer than the first Shaft and the budget allowed for better action, but it was nothing more than a solid action movie. It’s strange because the key cast members returned, Gordon Parks returned as director, and writer and creator of Shaft in Ernest Tidyman returned to write the screenplay. All the elements were there, but the final product was almost tedious to get through, with a shockingly slow second act. One key factor that hurt was Isaac Hayes not returning for the score, with the exception of the one song he contributed in “Type Thang”. Parks decides to make the main theme “Blowin’ Your Mind”, but it’s just a sad retread of the original theme song that tries way too hard to have the same impact.

It might be one of the worst decisions of the franchise, as “Theme from Shaft” is so linked to the character that it shouldn’t have even been a question as to if they should keep it or not. It’s a theme song that should always be a part of any Shaft-related production, just like the Star Wars theme is a part of every Star Wars production. Shaft had this golden opportunity to do the same thing years earlier with Hayes’s Oscar-winning jam, and they chose not to, which is certifiably insane. To think you can do it better or make something just as iconic to replace it is simply disrespectful.

Gus Mascola is memorable, but the tone of all his scenes has him come off as comical and too goofy in his presentation for a movie like this. When he tries to be threatening later on, he has no credibility because he’s nice to his henchmen, gives an exorbitant extension to Kelly on the money Kelly owes him when no mob boss would ever do so, and we see him wearing a robe and playing the clarinet for most of the movie. Along with having an Elvis-like haircut that doesn’t suit him, having a puffy face, and not possessing a single intimidating trait, despite being taller than everyone in the movie, everything about Gus fails when we look at how he’s written and who he is considered to be amongst the other characters in the world Tidyman has created. Even if they leaned into the humor regarding Mascola, it wouldn’t fit the tone. The character is miscast, badly performed, and badly written for someone who turns into the main villain by the end, as he didn’t do anything performance-wise in deserving it. He couldn’t even make us believe he was fucking that girl! The only thing Moscala has going for him is that he’s at least defined well compared to the many antagonists of the first movie. The same can be said with Johnny Kelly. The vile slimeball in Kelly was a better antagonist than Mascola and controlled the other half of the story due to Wally Taylor putting on the best performance his career. He understands the character well, acting like a dominant asshole to his girlfriend Rita because he knows he’s in a position of power but trying to act like a reasonable businessman with an underlying aura of twistedness when dealing with more powerful people than him like Mascola or Bumpy. Moreover, there are also moments where he tries to act like a tough guy to random people like shouting at an old lady “Where the hell you been with the goddamn elevator?” as if it was her fault it took so long. When she responds by telling him to watch his “fucking manners”, he’s almost shocked at the backtalk and just lets it go.

It just adds to how badly he wants to be “The man”, but he doesn’t have it in him to stack up against people who will challenge him. It’s why he strings Mascola for so long since Mascola keeps giving him a long leash, and he uses this to his advantage in buying more time for himself. On the flip side, it’s also why Kelly stresses how Shaft is the real deal because he knows he can’t intimidate someone like Shaft. Kelly is probably the best example of the screenwriter working hard to develop other aspects of the story outside of Shaft, and Wally Taylor does a respectable job in making this complicated scheme involving Cal, the money Kelly owes the mafia, how it’s all tied to his numbers racket in Queens, how everyone now wants a piece of it since Cal is dead, and how Kelly is looking to profit big without losing it all, something worth sitting all the way through for. The intrigue involving the funeral home was a nice inclusion to spice things up too, with the image of Shaft hiding in a casket and popping out as soon as Kelly leaves the room once the worker inadvertently implies that the money is in Cal’s casket was a very cool moment to show Shaft’s abilities as a sleuth. Though I did like how they setup his demise because the character was despicable enough to warrant such a terrible end, Kelly’s exit from the picture before the epic climax was a minor letdown since he was the strongest antagonist and character in general outside of Shaft. He was a big fish in a small pond and fucked around too much, so narrative-wise it was completely logical how things turned out, but getting rid of that strong of a personality takes the heat out of the climax because Shaft is just going up against lesser characters in the end, making things a tad too predictable despite the build.

Rounding out the supporting cast was the return of Bumpy and Willy. Had they not been in the sequel, it wouldn’t have been a dealbreaker or anything, but the two coming back was a nice surprise, especially having Shaft team up with Willy to act as window washers before breaking into Mascola’s condo to kick his ass. Admittedly, Willy asking Shaft if the window washing cover was absolutely necessary may have been the funniest line of the movie. The other being an exhausted Mascola asking Andy where he was, so he reminds Mascola how he wanted him to buy the peppers. Once he gets the confirmation that he bought the hot peppers, Mascola hilariously instructs, “Good, I’ll tell you what you do. You take them one at a time… and shove ’em up your ass”. The timing of it was great. Regardless, the fight, though sloppy and unimaginative in its choreography, was somewhat exciting, and Willy hitting Andy with the bottle was perfectly timed. Nevertheless, Shaft is dealing with the mafia here. Leaving them alive and walking out the front door is practically begging for them to come back even harder with a vengeance. For someone as intelligent as Shaft, him making such a crucial mistake is out of character. Plus, Mascola already attempted to kill Bumpy and Shaft at Bumpy’s place, which led to Bumpy sending Shaft over to Mascola’s to kill him. Shaft just deciding an ass kicking was enough is idiotic. Again, you’re dealing with the mafia! Going along with this, Mascola initially wanting to back off of Shaft because Shaft killed two of his relatives in a failed assassination attempt at Arna’s home doesn’t align with anything we know about the mafia in film or in real-life. It’s not until Kelly lies and says Shaft is trying to help Bumpy take his racket in Queens when Mascola decides he should step back in to send a message to Bumpy through Shaft.

Still, Mascola fully intending on backing off because Shaft is a badass makes him look like a major pussy, not this devious, money-hungry mafia villain driving the entire plot. It doesn’t help when he tries to threaten Shaft soon after and tries to slap the money out of Shaft’s hand, but it takes a few slaps because Shaft’s grip is too strong for him, prompting him to snatch it and stuff it in Shaft’s jacket pocket. Really, all of it made Mascola look like a bitch, which effects the third act greatly. For instance, the morbidity of grave robbing, and Kelly willing to dig up Cal to get the money but Mascola having no trouble in demanding Kelly take Cal’s body out of the casket, something that Kelly didn’t even want to do, was a great way to show how terrible all these people are and why Shaft has to take them out. Unfortunately, this golden scene isn’t as powerful as it should be because the bad guys aren’t the scary individuals they are portrayed to be, with Mascola being the biggest culprit.

The recurring joke between the first two movies of the series returning in that no one respects Willy was a nice treat too. When Kelly joins in on the fun Shaft usually has with Willy, his credibility is shot and it’s welcomed because it does something different with the character this time around to make him an ingrained part of the series.

There are some shootouts and action sequences that help further the legacy of the main character, with the third act entirely consisting of Shaft taking out bad guys to right the wrongs of the first movie’s short finish. You are invested in the elongated climax, but it’s just because Shaft is involved and we want to see him take out the bad guys. In actuality, nothing crazy or eventful actually happens. It’s just stretched-out filler that has been done better in plenty of other action movies. Even so, it’s loads better than the strikingly sluggish second act when we get knee-deep into the mystery at hand. Shaft’s Big Score! answers the craving fans had for wanting more action, but it’s a case of quantity over quality, with a lot of the action sequences being edited with little care or interest and nothing noteworthy happening in the midst of the gunfire. For example, the chase where Shaft has Mascola on the boat, and the helicopter with Mascola’s men are in hot pursuit of him is the same thing exact thing for miles. It’s just a straight shot and it takes forever. The same could be said with the car chase that precedes it. Instead of doing some fast cutting with Shaft and Rita’s faces, some funny quips or cool catchphrases hurled back and forth, and the villains scrambling on what to do, while getting their own closeups in-between loud and significant gunshots from both cars, it’s about as basic as car chase sequences get. Considering how much bigger the budget is, it comes off as a lazy approach to one of the more crucial action sequences of a sequel that should be better in every category. Then again, maybe they used the entirety of the budget on fueling the helicopter that dominates the last 15 minutes of the movie. That stuff isn’t cheap.

In addition, Shaft himself kind of loses a step. His best trait in 1971’s Shaft was his balls of steel and never looking outclassed in a fight because he was that much of a badass. In this sequel, he doesn’t look nearly as tough as he did before. It’s the most “regular” the private investigator has ever looked in the series, and it gets close to where the aura surrounding him has noticeable holes in it. For example, the horribly done fight sequence in Mother Ike’s club has Shaft get his ass handed to him by three guys in slow motion while it’s interspliced with strippers dancing, he’s thrown down a flight of stairs, and then thrown into a pile of garbage outside. Once he gets up, he just walks home like a sad sack of shit, bloody and defeated. It’s the most vulnerable we ever see John Shaft in the entire series, and it should be a shocking, monumental moment. Sadly, this HUGE moment is botched because of how atrocious the fight sequence was. Besides this, the John Shaft from the first film would have gotten back up, busted back in with a lead pipe or something, and would have demanded a Round 2 on the spot. What happened to the Shaft we know and love from just a year prior? In another instance, the out of shape and unintimidating Mascola is for some reason an even match for Shaft and nearly beats him in a one-on-one in his living room to the point where Shaft asks Willy for help. It’s ludicrous for fans because of all the people the protagonist might have trouble with, there’s no way in hell it would be Mascola in any stretch of the imagination! On an inconsistent note, they go in the complete opposite direction for the climax at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, which is arguably just as insulting but in a different way. In a precursor to the “invincible” action hero trope of mythic proportions that would later become popular in the 80s and 90s, a chunk of the climax has Shaft shot at by one of Mascola’s henchmen on foot and another who’s sharpshooting from the side of a helicopter. Yet Shaft is not hit a single fucking time!

Mind you, he’s the only target they have in the ENTIRE location!

Apparently, Mascola’s men are worse aims than stormtroopers because as cool as it was to watch the black leather clad Shaft figure out a way to take the bad guys out in the jazz-infused finale, his lack of vulnerability in what should be the most nerve-racking, heart-stopping part of the movie was egregious. Look, the toughness and fearlessness of Shaft is one of the best parts about the character, as well as how strong he looked against anyone he deemed an adversary in the first movie. Nevertheless, there is a moment where Shaft runs into an airplane hangar and the helicopter flies right behind him, meaning they are both in one closed-off building. Not only does Shaft outrun the flying vehicle, but he runs the entire length of the building, in a STRAIGHT LINE, without getting shot a single time! The entirety of the shootout had the guy hanging off the helicopter shooting at Shaft’s feet and missing EVERY SINGLE SHOT! Shaft wasn’t shielded or hidden by a single thing! He ran straight ahead! Even if Shaft was an Olympic sprinter (and he apparently makes a case for it in this movie), there is no way any person who trains with a gun on the regular misses his ONLY target that many times unless he’s pointing his gun straight at the fucking ground! I love over-the-top action movies more than anyone, but this was asinine, especially because of the inconsistency regarding how vulnerable he looked in the earlier fight scenes in the movie. You pick one version of Shaft or the other. You can’t have both in the same movie. For Shaft to be the only person in that hangar, and it’s just him and the helicopter hot on his tail, him walking out of there without a scratch is legitimately impossible. To add to the ridiculousness, the only time Shaft gets injured in the climax is on his volition after he trips on the steep walkway up that metal structure when Andy is chasing him. He starts limping because he pulled something, but it’s the only time Shaft got hurt in the climax. We can suspend our disbelief for a lot of things, but the ending of Shaft’s Big Score! will test your patience.

Speaking of the impossible feats that happen in this sequel, the scene where some random guy runs out of Arna’s house and eludes Shaft by escaping out of the front door once Kelly got in his way was just as outrageous. As soon as Shaft gets to the door, the guy’s car is heard driving off. The timing of this is virtually impossible because Shaft just missed grabbing the guy. The only way that man escapes in seconds coming out of that doorway would be if the man was riding a jeep with no doors, it was already on, it was parked directly in front of the fucking door, and there was a getaway driver and that guy just jumped into the passenger seat. Even if Kelly got in Shaft’s way for the second or two that he did, someone like Shaft who’s apparently a sprinter on the level of a professional athlete, as evidenced by the ending of the film, should have no problem reaching the guy or identifying him before he drives off the property. All of it is just too inconsistent with the story told or what we are led to believe are the protagonist’s abilities. On top of that, the man was technically already in the house when Shaft, Kelly, and Arna got there. The driveway is small but placed directly in front of the house, so wouldn’t this random guy’s car have to be seen when they pulled up? There’s no possible place to hide this other car, but we are supposed to believe it was there before them and is magically close to the front door minutes after they show up? The idea may have worked under the right circumstances, but it was executed terribly with little care for detail, a consistent knock on this sequel. Rosalind Miles has a lifeless performance as Arna by the way. Considering all the trauma and terror Arna faces throughout the events of the movie, there’s no reason as to why she sounds like she’s reading lines straight off the script. Even after shooting through the door in terror because she didn’t know it was Bollin knocking, there’s little energy in her attempting to sound fearful.

Right after, Shaft laughs while explaining how Bollin will be back with a warrant for what she did, and she asks as flatly as possible, “Why are they after me?”. Had Miles put any effort into the screentime she was given, she could have stolen a lot of scenes from an acting perspective. Unfortunately, she was dreadful. Kathy Imrie’s Rita is a hell of a lot more memorable, even though the character’s out-of-nowhere devotion to Shaft and willingness to be his driver while being chased by a bunch of killers didn’t make a ton of sense. In the middle of the chase sequence where she’s driving, she tries to give Shaft a handjob and he has to tell her to keep both hands on the wheel. Kelly really did a number on her, didn’t he?

There is a litany of things worth crediting too though, even if they do sound minor. Other than the great use of a dummy in place of Andy’s body in the finale, one great idea was having Shaft kneel in front of the passenger seat to shoot out the window instead of doing the usual in sitting and constantly turning around. This way, it gives the hero a clear shot from the window on a consistent basis without having to uncomfortably turn the entire body. It’s an ingenious move, and it makes you wonder why no other action hero on film has attempted such a thing. On top of that, there’s another moment where Shaft tells Arna to stay in while grabbing his gun to stop Mascola and Kelly. She only gets a single word out to try and stop him from leaving, but Shaft just simply responds, “Not now baby. Not now” before kissing her and leaving. Has this ever happened this smoothly without a protest or argument form a love interest to the hero, or is this just an example of the misogynistic writing of the time where Shaft just shuts her up? Though the time period in which the film came out gives evidence to the latter, I’d like to think this is just more of a character trait of John Shaft specifically and how he commands a room. He knows what she’s going to say, but he also knows what has to be done as the hero and just stops her before they even have the conversation. It’s kind of funny in a way. It’s like he’s telling her, “You and I both know I have to do this. What’s the point of even arguing?”. Another cool trait carried on from the first movie is Shaft signifying to the audience that business is picking up when he puts on the all-black leather outfit. When he grabs that gun behind his fake books and is in this attire, it’s like Bruce Wayne putting on the Batman costume. On that note, the gun he used in the third act was something else! It looks like a sniper rifle, it sounds like a cannon, the shells he has in the hollowed-out book are massive, it has the ability to blow a single massive shot but also a buckshot-like spray that he utilizes on the helicopter, and it’s light enough for him to duel wield it with his pistol.

Where did he find that thing?

Despite it hurting the moving from a logistics standpoint, Richard Roundtree does deserve credit for being in great shape physically. The ending at the Navy Yard is almost entirely him running at a full sprint, and he doesn’t look gassed whatsoever. Plus, we got that awesome silhouette of the helicopter behind him while he ran. It’s painting-worthy. The dedication the actor has into making his character look that good in the heat of battle due to his conditioning is quite admirable. He doesn’t just show off his ability in the finale either. Another great example is during the aforementioned infiltration of Mascola’s condo, with Willy opening the window for Shaft to run inside and pounce on him. The quickness in which he got from the windowsill to tackling Mascola was insane!

Shaft’s Big Score! is given the same crew, a longer length, a more detail-orientated case, better written characters, and a bigger budget to make an explosive sequel that should smash through its predecessor without trouble. Alas, it’s only mildly entertaining, and that’s solely due to star Richard Roundtree refusing to let his character or the movie fail. Besides him and some flashes of great action, Shaft’s Big Score! can be a slog to get through. There’s more action than the first movie, but it’s of poor quality and at times uneventful, the movie doesn’t use its time well and needed at least one more trip to the editing room to trim down some dreadfully long takes that were not needed, the stunt choreographer (if there was one) should be shot, and once the details are revealed with secondary antagonist Kelly trying to barter percentages of his business with the bigger names in town and double crossing everyone, we kind of just stop caring and want Shaft to start kicking everyone’s ass. Thankfully, we at least got that. Though Shaft’s Big Score! is a cleaner production than the first movie, it loses the style, the cool factor, the grittiness, and toughness that made the 1971 film what it was. In effect, this sequel made Shaft just a tad too Hollywood for our liking, which is a shame because they had the budget to do something epic. With that being said, it’s still a solid entry in the Shaft series because it’s still worth watching anytime we get to see John Shaft kill bad guys in another wild plot. It didn’t raise the bar the original film set, but just seeing Roundtree back in action will always be entertaining to a degree. As one of cinema’s greatest heroes, he’s too cool to be ignored and brings life to the movie anytime he’s on camera.