Are women in Blaxploitation movies degraded or liberated?

Foxy didn't get revenge by taking her clothes off. That whole thing with the judge, she unhooked her bra, then tripped him over Claudia, out the door, hooked it back on, called him a pink-ass corrupt honky judge and slammed the door on him, for everybody to see him without the benefit of his boxers.

I believe women in blaxploitation movies are liberated because you see sort of the ordinary, every day kind of woman, take out dope pushers and the mob and such, with as director Jack Hill puts it, with her wit, intuition and femininity. She's not a Superwoman or a female James Bond or Batgirl or anything like that, all she has to go on to take out the bad guys is anything she can get her hands on...like in Foxy Brown, she attacks one guy at the ranch with a bunch of wire hangers bent together, and Coffy, she put razor blades in her Afro and sharpened a bobby pin to make it a deadly weapon...which I might add, Pam Grier HERSELF suggested to Jack Hill to put in the script, he never could've thought of that.

And Coffy...yeah, she had to take her clothes off, sleep with King George, and have her titty popping out when she's with Sugar Man...of course that was all so nobody would suspect anything and she could actually get in close enough for the kill. Coffy and Foxy are both women with missions, and they're going to right the wrongs inflicted upon their families and friends, no matter what the cost is. Which is more than a lot of people would do and everybody knows it. These kinds of movies show regular women who do the extraordinary because they're smart, quick thinking and quick acting, and they live to see another day.

Everyone, including the audience, in any -xploitation movie is degraded. That's the point. Or one of the points anyway.

What's the spanish for drunken bum?

Sex Sells. Men Know that, but ALSO women know that. Pam Grier's characters were bangin and they knew it. A man may be stronger, faster and bigger than a woman (generally) but no (straight :P) is totally immune to the charms of a foxy, brown seductress.

Now if you are doing a paper on ALL women in Blaxploitation movies, then yes of course many were degraded or at least used as sexual eye-candy and nothing else. That's of course true for about every movie genre and time-period though.

But in regards to Grier's movies, I feel it is fairly liberating. She takes sh!t into her own hands and gets it done. Hell, if you had her body, you'd probably show it off too! haha.

It's a double edge sword. Blaxploitation and Sexploitation gave a lot of actresses a chance of playing a leading role and to play strong female heroes. Yet let's not kid ourselves. I like the genre but it's pretty sleazy. I'd say it liberated women if they were willing to degrade themselves a bit by accepting needless nudity.

I think of this as very much a Blaxploitation film. The movie was made by white Hollywood for the African American audience with kind of a ridiculous use of stereotypical black language, dress, roles, etc. Later, directors like Spike Lee and others came along to create movies with more rich and varied characters and stories. These earlier movies opened the doors for movies that you wouldn't call Blaxploitation. I am glad these movies were made. I ordered Shaft two nights ago and Foxy Brown last night through Amazon Instant Video each for $2.99. I watched them both with my son to expose him to the Blaxploitaion subgenre. We both enjoyed the heck out of them in a campy sort of way. Grier played a role in a sleazy 70's film like a lot of white actresses did. She portrayed a strong, heroic character though. She was great. I may see Coffy next.

Yes.

I don’t think that Pam Grier’s characters are actually degrading to women in that sense. In most cases she uses sex like a tool in her arsenal to get what she wants. She is always the one who is outsmarting and manipulating the bad guys.