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Soul Vengeance
[Xenon Pictures]
1975; color
Directed by Jamaa Fanaka
Starring: Marlo Monte, Reatha Grey, Stan Kamber & Tiffany Peters
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Long-rumored to be the worst blaxploitation flick ever made, I've been wanting to see Soul Vengeance since I bought the movie poster almost 20 years ago. (Although the one I have is for it's original theatrical title: Welcome Home Brother Charles.) This is the first film by Jamaa Fanaka, who's probably best known for directing the Penitentiary trilogy. The entire movie, except for the first and last minute, is a flashback and what a wild ride it is! Charles, we're soon to find out, is the biggest dope dealer in Watts. He then gets busted by two cops; one straight, one corrupt and racist. Before they can even haul Charles down to the station though, the bad cop puts a beating on him in the car (while the other cop is away having a smoke) which culminates in the attempted castration of Charles - with a straight razor no less. By the time his trial rolls around he's obviously healed enough to be in court, but the white man's law thwarts his opportunity to speak about his "situation" and sends him up the river. Two things happen to Charles while he's in prison; one fairly logical, the other… not so much. He decides to go straight, vowing to himself to not spend the rest of his life "on the white man's installment plan" (i.e., prison), and he develops strange mind-controlling powers and a secret weapon that must be seen to be believed. (And even then, it's kind of unbelievable). Three years into his sentence our "hero" gets paroled and goes back home. Unfortunately home, as in the old neighborhood, has changed a lot in those years and Charles is back to being just another brother on the wrong side of just about everything. His girlfriend now works for his former best friend, N.D., a dealer who took over his turf and apparently never showed up with promised bail money way back when. This, and few other circumstances, leads Charles into the arms of a soon-to-be-ex-hooker who originally tried to save him when he was being busted. They shack up immediately and she quits whorin' to get a "straight" job, something Charles' prison stretch prevents him from having. But her man is dreaming of something besides a legit paycheck—revenge. First he sets his sights on the cop who tried to castrate him. He goes to the guy's house, posing as a telephone repairman, and apparently hypnotizes the guy's wife with his penis. Later that night he shows up at the front door. She lets him in and he tells her to wait in the hallway by the kids' room, which she obediently does. We hear muffled screams from the master bedroom implying a horrible death. Next up is the DA who put him away. His wife is similarly "dick-notized," and this time we see the instrument of destruction in action. Charles, you see, has somehow gained the ability to make his penis grow to massive length (we're talking yards, not feet or inches) and choke people to death like a boa constrictor. A boner constrictor, if you will. (The how and why is never explained; but, really, how could it be.) This is without a doubt one of the most original and hilarious props ever! Charles then goes after the judge who sent him away but, unbeknownst to him, the police have been on his trail and before he can unzip, he's chased by the cops to the roof of the judge's apartment building. As he teeters on the edge of the roof, threatening to jump, we're right back to where the film started. While this is not Fanaka's best, it's far from the worst blaxploitation flick I've seen; if you're a fan of the genre, this is absolutely a must-see.
—the Kommandant
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