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El Fang
Reviews
Penitentiary (1979)
Blaxploitation worth 100 lame contemp. Hollywood "action" films!
Lowlife scum's, trashola conns and pscyhotronics check this one out! A masterpiece of exploitation, PENITENTIARY(1979) is especially worth watching because of it's strange, neo-realism. Often I enjoyed watching wall-hangings or shoes for it's 70s appeal as much as the foreground action! An almost all-unknown cast (that also contributes a lot to the movie's appeal), realistic 1970s African American dialog and backgrounds, realistic and mind-bending scenes of perverse violence and huge doses of humor make this a blast in every department. Very realistic scenes of prison -- including sexual -- life, and the knowledge that this was NOT written by some Hollywood screenwriter (and same-schmuk's idea of "what prison must be like"), along with the near-documentary feel make this a must-see. I've seen 100s so-called Hollywood "action" films in the last few years, most of which I remember nothing about ("Was that the one with Stallone or Bruce Willis?"), and each of which cost 100s of times as much as the unforgettable PENITENTIARY! Note: Don't miss PEN 2 (the debut of Mr. T., and a Rudy Ray Moore cameo, no less); and PEN 3, which many believe to be the best of the three. But, the first will always be may favorite. Oh yeah -- the PLOT involves boxing matches in a corrupt ('natch) prison, but thankfully rarely gets in the way of the fun and action!