Directed by Gordon Parks • 1971 • United States
Starring Richard Roundtree, Moses Gunn, Charles Cioffi
“Hotter than Bond. Cooler than Bullitt,” the movie posters proclaimed. And as embodied by an ultrabadass Richard Roundtree, John Shaft is indeed a detective to reckon with: a stylish, streetwise private eye whose hunt for the kidnapped daughter of a Harlem mobster lands him in the middle of feuding crime syndicates in gritty 1970s New York. Set to the hot-buttered grooves of Isaac Hayes’s landmark funk-soul soundtrack, this Blaxploitation classic witnessed the birth of a new cinematic hero who would become an icon for an era of change.
Directed by Gordon Parks • 1972 • United States
Starring Richard Roundtree, Moses Gunn, Drew Bundini Brown
Richard Roundtree reunites with director Gordon Parks for this sequel to their trendsetting Blaxploitation landmark SHAFT. New York City private detective John Shaft (Roundtree) gets a pred...
Directed by Gordon Parks • 1984 • United States
Starring Avery Brooks, Rhetta Greene, Petronia Paley
Gordon Parks directs the original film adaptation of abolitionist Solomon Northup’s 1853 autobiography “Twelve Years a Slave,” later the basis for the Academy Award–winning drama by Steve McQueen...
Directed by Gordon Parks • 1987 • United States
Gordon Parks turns his camera on his own life and art in this gorgeous, elegiac essay film, in which he interweaves his photography, music, and poetry into a lyrical self-portrait of a modern-day Renaissance man. Recounting his life’s journey—from ...
