BOSS NIGGER (THE BLACK BOUNTY KILLER)

(director: Jack Arnold; screenwriter: Fred Williamson; cinematographer: Bob Caramico; editors: Gene & Eva Ruggiero; music: Leon Moore; cast: Fred Williamson (Boss), D’Urville Martin (Amos), R. G. Armstrong (Mayor), Willianm Smith (Jed Clatton), Don Red Barry (Doc), Barbara Leigh (Miss Pruitt), Carmen Hayworth (Clara Mae), Carmen Zapata (Marguerita), Joe Alfasa (Pedro), Sonny Robbins (Bad Foot); Runtime: 92; MPAA Rating: PG; producers: Fred Willianson/Jack Arnold; VCI Entertainment; 1975)

“Obnoxious racist Western comedy, a blaxploitation film, that lacks wit and taste.”

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz

Obnoxious racist Western comedy, a blaxploitation film, that lacks wit and taste. It’s surprisingly directed by Jack Arnold (“It Came From Outer Space”/”Creature from the Black Lagoon“), who was known in the 1950s for his sci-fi monster B films. The script by the star and the ex-football player of the Raiders, Fred ‘The Hammer’ Williamson hits a low level even for the many exploitative black genre films of the 1970s. Every white character is not a nice person and subject to ridicule. Two black bounty hunters, former slaves, Boss (Fred Williamson) and Amos (D’Urville Martin), both dressed in black leather, track down bank robbers and kill them on the trail. They keep the loot and turn one wanted dead robber over for a reward in the nearby town. On the trail again, the duo rescue a black woman (Carmen Hayworth) from the white killers of her wagon-driver father and bring her back to San Miguel, a small lawless town in the New Mexico Territory, to stay with the Mexican-American rancher Pedro (Joe Alfasa). San Miguel is a town without a sheriff, run by the corrupt sleazy mayor (R. G. Armstrong). Boss forces the mayor to hire him as sheriff and Amos as his deputy. The gist of the film is the black duo going after the bad-ass wanted outlaw Jed Clayton (William Clayton) and his notorious gang, who blackmail the town for supplies to be safe. Boss Nigger’s main boast is that it uses the racial slur ‘nigger’ more times than Blazing Saddles. Otherwise it’s a forgettable film with a crude script, crude acting and sloppy execution.

REVIEWED ON 9/12/2016 GRADE: C-