Rating: 
Summary: Sweet Melvin's Horrible Asssss Movie
Review: This is one of the worst motion pictures ever made and I am not exaggerating in the slightest. Forget the technical stuff-bad lighting, worse acting and no screenplay to speak of, this is boring, incoherent and almost unwatchably slow. It gets a lot of credit for being the grandaddy of "Blaxploitation" cinema, but the truth is black movies were about to happen anyway and this one just happened to get there first. If I could give this zero stars, I would, but unfortunately one is as low as you can go. Unmitigated crap!!!
Rating:
Summary: Groundbreaking? Maybe. Unwatchable? Definitely.
Review: This is possibly the worst movie I've ever seen. The direction, camera work, and editing are so awful that I could hardly even tell what was going on. (It's presumably supposed to be trippy and surreal, but instead it's merely annoying and confusing.) The acting is miserable, the script is practically nonexistent, and the music is grating and repetitive. The only thing even remotely worthwhile about the movie is that Melvin Van Peebles as Sweetback look kind of cool when he mugs for the camera. Supposedly this was a groundbreaking movie in its time (1971) because it shows that white society fears a strong black man. A worthy message, perhaps, but this movie certainly doesn't convey it effectively.
Rating:
Summary: Run Melvin Run!!
Review: This is the first Blaxploitation movie and gets a lot of hype because it was released a couple of months before Shaft. So what. It's trash.
Superfly, Shaft, any others are better than this. Please don't listen about the people rambling on about the artsy quality of this film. No lighting is no lighting no matter how you cut it. If you want to see Melvin Van Peebles on screen running, literally running, for over 25 minutes of film, in a gold velveteen vest, then buy this movie. This movie is a Melvin egofest. Nothing more. Save 90 minutes of your life and skip this.
Rating: 
Summary: Melvin VS The Man
Review: This is the movie that defined the genre of blaxploitation before The Man decided to bound the genre by making aversion films like SHAFT or SHEBA films. Melvin made a great attempt in the 90's about delimiting true blaxploitation from counter-blaxploitation. A better understanding of his point would be to simply watch SHAFT and then this film (the lines are clear cut).
Rating:
Summary: Only Serves To Nauseate
Review: This may be the least watchable film I have ever seen. This was recommended to a friend by Amazon because of our purchases of the comparatively enlightening and morally uplifting Dolemite videos. This movie begins by condoning the statutory rape of a ten year old boy, and descends to new depths of film depravity. The one recurring theme in this film is: RUNNING! YES! How exciting can in get watching Sweet run for what seems like hours. This belongs exactly where we put our copy:in the garbage.
Rating: 
Summary: amazing due to what is behind the camera
Review: This movie is best when viewed after Badassss!. Its not that its poor independent of this, of course, but is vastly more interesting than it would be otherwise when you know the context behind the movie.
As a film, this is both visually interesting and horrible. Grain never seems to end, there is a certain collage quality about the visuals that is interesting, and it has a great score. The story is socially relevant in some ways and completely overblown in others. Directing is good in respect to shot choice and the overall scope of the film.
What is important about this film is how, why, and when it was made. If put in its proper historical context, if the dedication of the filmmaker is put into context, and/or if the ethnic makeup of the crew is put into context, its groundbreaking. What is important about the film is not really the film, but the people surrounding it.
The sheer idea that Van Peebles had a vision, and that he did so much to put that vision out there makes him exceptional. Its not really the talent, its the drive. The images on the screen aren't necessarily all that wonderful. Instead, the sheer fact that they are up there, that they were spewed forth upon the earth by an artist, is astounding. That any person was/is able to have the audacity to believe their vision is worthy of exhibition and expression is absolutely poetic. Its not that he did it, or that it was grand; its that he had the courage to do it, and that it ended up being his own. Its his own personal vision, and that is always such a refreshing, inspiring, and endlessly amazing thing for any artist, or anyone for that matter, to see.
Rating:
Summary: Baaaaaddddd DVD quality
Review: This movie may have been groundbreaking in its day, but the DVD is horrendous in terms of image and sound quality. Why wasn't this film cleaned up if it's an anniversary edition? The image has too much debris and the crackling and hissing in several sections of the soundtrack is annoying.Some of the acting is amateurish, but there are moments when the cinematography, editing, and directing is excellent. I would given the movie 5 stars for its uniqueness alone had it not been for this grotesque DVD transfer!
Rating:
Summary: One of the Worst!
Review: This movie stinks. There is little, if any, story. Most of the time is spent watching Van Peebles running down streets, running down alleys, running across roof tops, running on/under/over/across lots of other things. The rest of it is spent with him stopping long enough to screw (not really have sex or make love; screw is the better term) women or kill white men. If a white man had made this movie, there would have been a lot of outrage expressed about how simplistic and low life the bulk of the African Americans portrayed in this poor excuse for a movie were. The only ones who can enjoy this flick are people who need a way to vent their rage, especially anti-white rage.
Rating:
Summary: Baadasssss is Bad asss
Review: This movie was revolutionary. Unfortunately it spark the blaxploitation era in cinema, a genre of low budget kill whitey flics, that with their high violence, low budgets, and great soundtracks(minus the political message of Sweetback) began to define an era in cinema when black directors where able to make black movies with black cast in leading roles. Released independently by Melvin Van Peoples in 1971 at a time when blacks in the cinema was next to non-existent (unless they were docile and shuffling their feet). Sweetback tells the story of a man that has had enough of the man and fights back. This movie was revolutionary from its polititcal message to its cinematography. The cinematography of this film which set the president for all other blaxploitation movies to follow was amazing.
Rating: 
Summary: Sweet Sweetpiece of confusion
Review: Well! The initial scenes of child sex and abuse nearly made me switch off but I had read so much about the revolutionary chractersitics of the film that I kept on. The result: I was seriously concerned by the limited articulation of the black voice and the degredation of black women. On it's own, the film fails to achieve the percieved aim of shattering sociological stereotypes. The principal character is a pimp and his expression is limited to sex and violence and the women (white and black) are sex objects. However, in a historical context the film goes beyond the narrow bounds of smiling domestics and water melon guzzling buffoons that dominated pre 1970s representations of black people. I dunno perhaps this is what was real to Van Peebles and much of the black population in US ghettos. Helpful? yes, to those who could finally see themselves as heros; Damaging? Yes because we still live in a world too narrow minded to percieve race as a social construct and not a biological trait in terms of personality and value systems.
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