Review of Cleopatra Jones (1973) by Bryan G — 04 Jun 2009

I'm a huge fan of exploitation films, which is a fancy way of saying trashy cinema. The 1970's was pretty much the golden era for these sorts of films, and a lot of them have ranked among my favorite films of all time. I tend to like exploitation films that have strong female leads, like Switchblade Sisters (which I reviewed a few weeks back).

Now when it comes to memorable female leads from this era, Pam Grier always comes to mind as being the stand out from the pack. But I felt an urge to give another actress' films a chance, which is why I selected Cleopatra Jones off of Netflix the other week.

Tamara Dobson portrays the title character of Cleopatra Jones, who is a secret government agent and international spy, or something like that. There is something likable about Dobson as an actor, but she just doesn't bring Cleopatra Jones to life enough for the character to truly stand out. She talked loud, could take on anyone and could handle just about any dangerous task without getting scratched. But the character felt false to me, and too larger than life to believe and too silly to enjoy on screen.

The movie also suffers from very poor pacing, and a lack of focus in the story. There are far too many characters in Cleopatra Jones, most of which go in and out of the story so much you begin to forget who they are when they pop back up later on in the film. And because of me losing track of who was who, I also began to lose track of what exactly was going on in the film.

There are two saving graces to Cleopatra Jones. J.J. Johnson's score was particularly great, especially during the fight sequences (which were noticeably choreographed, and highly unsatisfying to watch). And then there was the ever wonderful Shelly Winters, who I have to wonder how the hell ended up in a film like this, as the movie's main villain Mommy. Maybe it was seeing her in a role that was so different from what I'm accustomed to seeing her in that made her presence in this film so memorable.

The problem with most exploitation films is that most of them rely on their larger than life character(s) to carry the film. Sometimes it works, like in the cast of Shaft or Foxy Brown. But sometimes, the character just isn't crafted well, or just isn't interesting enough to make you forget how lackluster the story is, like in the case of Cleopatra Jones.