He’s a Complicated Man

Shaft’s Big Score! will blow your mind. It’s basically the first movie, but with a much bigger budget. Since Shaft was a major hit that ignited the Blaxploitation genre. Richard Roundtree and the original director return with only a year between movies. Shaft’s Big Score! is a groovy sequel with much more action to turn John Shaft into a more hands on action hero. The main similarity is Shaft once again dealing with New York gangsters both black and white.

Shaft’s Big Score! refers to a large sum of money connected to the brother of his current girlfriend. When he’s killed, Shaft contacts his old gangster associates and investigates each gangs role in the matter. All the while continuing to be a sex machine to all the chicks. Pretty much every female character ends up naked at some point in the movie. Shaft’s Big Score may lack the raw sincerity of the original, but it makes up for it with large scale action sequences.

Most slow parts are at the beginning with the violence really kicking in near the end. Shaft engages in fist fights, has a cemetery shoot out, takes part in a car chase, a speedboat chase, and even shoots down a helicopter. It’s exciting, but not really enough to make the sequel memorable. They didn’t even have Oscar winner Isaac Hayes to score the film. So the new theme can’t really measure up. Shaft’s Big Score! does big things and scores some points for its efforts.

John Shaft takes aim

Preceded by: Shaft & Followed by: Shaft in Africa