Renny Roker stars as Chris Townes, a volatile young man who drifts from job to job, and even gets in trouble with the law. As aimless as he is, his consciousness does get raised as he meets Mindy (Marie O'Henry), a recreation director at a school. Regularly, Mindy and the students, including a paraplegic named Little Joe (Danny Martin), are terrorized by bullying local drug pushers.
Ultimately, this is a quite sobering treatise on the elements tearing apart the black community from within. Its low budget shows quite readily, and while the filmmaking may lack slickness, the message still comes through loud and clear. The script, by producer-director Horace Jackson, does fall back on speechifying at the end, as Chris addresses the audience directly in an urgent wake-up call. You'll realize that when tragedies strike near the end of the film, things won't be resolved anytime soon. Still, it's hard to deny the satisfaction of seeing one of the antagonists be ostracized by his father.
The actors are similarly impassioned themselves, although with the character of Chris, it's not a quick progression / character arc. Much of the cast is made up of no-names, although veteran actress Juanita Moore (the 1959 version of "Imitation of Life") makes a special appearance, and you might recognize O'Henry from "Three the Hard Way" & "Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde" and Roker from "Melinda" & "Honky Tonk Freeway".
As with many blaxploitation features, one of the joys lies in the music score, performed by "The Enchantment", although it may be just a little TOO omnipresent.
Obviously, this is something of an obscurity within its genre, but blaxploitation fans should find it to be interesting.
Seven out of 10.
