I considered seeing Shaft (2019) in theaters in spite of the bad reviews because I support black movies-black director, black film history and black cast! It was playing at my favorite theater with the real butter popcorn. I am a completist. I probably saw the original (1971) on VHS tape or when it aired on television. While I have few memories, fond or otherwise, of Samuel L. Jackson’s initial turn as the titular character in Shaft (2000), which John Singleton (RIP) directed, I finish what I start. I saw Singleton’s film in the theaters so I was going to see the sequel in the theater; however waiting eighteen years to produce a sequel does not help. My completist tendencies only come into play because I want to understand the complete story, and if I cannot remember the story because it has been almost decades since I saw it, it is less completist and more frustrating as I struggle to remember what I forgot. Still it should have been a done deal, but the number of showings plummeted, and I never made it happen so I subconsciously must have believed the bad reviews.
I watched Shaft (2019) as soon as it was available for home viewing on DVD during a horrible point my life, and it was not good. Thank God for busy schedules! I need a comedic genius to do a TED talk to explain why some irreverent comedies are hilarious, but others are self-consciously irreverent and thus not a little bit funny. Oh sorry, did you think Shaft (2019) would be an action crime thriller like its predecessors? No, it is an action comedy crime movie, which could be delightful if the comedy bits actually made me LOL, but did not so it was not.
Shaft (2019) is a one hour fifty-one minute hacky joke fest to see who is more black and who is more manly. Black and manly equal cool, anything else and womanly being uncool. If you are black and manly, you can cross the street without looking both ways and people will just stop for you; you are emotionless even when sad because that is what soundtrack music is for; you can day drink (and thousands of ladies who lunch and depressed people on the job suddenly can put black on their census form); you can be extremely violent without consequences, which means you can have a gun, not the ladies, and even hold it to a relative’s head because how would someone with a vagina hold it. With their hands, like a barbarian!?! I think not.
Do you know who is black, womanly and cool? Pam Grier and countless other women. Unless it has happened, the following is my idea and no one can have it without paying me, but it would have been cool if someone had taken all the blackploitation figures in one movie. Instead Shaft (2019) makes the same mistake that The Dark Tower and countless other films make. These films think that I need a young, everyman protagonist to relate to so I can get into the mythology of the universe. As Samuel L. Jackson would say, no, motherfucker, I do not. If we are being honest, Jackson is not even the real Shaft, Richard Roundtree is. By further watering the film down to a child, ahem, young man that I do not know, you just decreased my interest in your movie. I am not slandering Jessie T. Usher, whom I apparently saw in Independence Day: Resurgence and will see in The Boys and The Banker, but no one came for him even though Usher did the best that he could do with the material that he was given.
Shaft (2019) follows Usher’s character, JJ, a FBI agent kind of, who decides to investigate his friend’s death, but needs his dad’s help. It takes over twenty-one minutes to get JJ to reunite with his father, who seems to have glitter in his mustache and goatee though the stripper that he hooked up with does not have any glitter. The tension between the father and son makes more sense once you realize that Black-ish’s Kenya Barris wrote the screenplay. Just imagine any number of conversations between Dre and Pops or Dre and his eldest son, Andre. Just see a therapist. You are not one of the creatives who is mining your daddy issues and coming out with gold. Get over it, yesterday. There is a point when you are getting too old to have daddy issues.
The generation gap called, it wants its schtick back. It could have worked if JJ clearly could tolerate his dad, and if Shaft L. was not disgusted by his son. JJ kept ribbing on his dad’s financial health and education, which felt like it applied to a different movie. Shaft L has a business, a really nice office/home and expensive clothes. Jackson is a funny actor as Captain Marvel proved, but he would need a brick wall behind him and a time machine to make these jokes work. How is your son’s sexuality in question because he has nice décor, but you have nice décor?
It is absurd that neither met the other before this movie based on some “it was too dangerous for me to be around you” crap. Also I do not care if Shaft is supposed to be the icon of sexy, but no American child wants to hear or see his pervy parent get down. It is gross, not cool or funny. Also Shaft L is the epitome of manhood, but he needs over the counter erectile cream? Needing erectile cream does not mean that you are manly or not, but for a film so trite in its gender normative, aggressive heterosexuality, it is a weird admission to casually make.
Shaft (2019) could have worked as the ultimate childhood fantasy with your dad being able to beat up anyone. I would prefer if the film led with the most famous person in the film as the protagonist then find a way to bring in the son if you are really that desperate to get a franchise going. If they are going to be estranged, have a Taken situation where Shaft L. discovers that his child and ex are in danger and has to proactively return to protect them. Then Barris could get his parents back together on screen like a child of divorce also dreams until they get older and are supposed to outgrow that shit then thank God that they got divorced in the first place so did not have to spend twenty-four seven with them. Barris, therapy!
The funniest scene in Shaft (2019) is thanks to Luna Lauren Velez. It draws on Jackson’s fame and racism in the media. Adrienne C. Moore as the Uber Driver needed to actually write the movie if that scene was improvised. Then Regina King does her best to retain the levity and inject some freshness into black woman stereotypes (bathroom scene), which I will reluctantly allow because King is an American treasure. Jackson’s funniest scene is in a hotel hallway, which in the real world would end differently. Alexandra Shipp cracked me up during the denouement with one line.
Shaft (2019) should be an action film first and anything else second. The action does not really begin to take off until one hour twelve minutes into the proceeding when Usher can pat himself on the back for getting the first fun action scene, i.e. the first scene where viewers can appreciate the choreography of the violence without worrying about the consequences, which is too damn long. I could forgive a lot of crap jokes if the action was nonstop, but it is lukewarm. Also sucker punching some security guard who is making minimum wage is uncool. Bribe him or give him a choice. He does not have medical insurance.
Do not see Shaft (2019), but if you must see this movie, forward to one hour thirty-one minutes for the real Shaft fan fiction to begin.
