Blaxploitation 101: How black filmmakers took on the system and got shafted

Blaxploitation is the genre that gave the world kickass black heroes (like Richard Roundtree, Pam Grier, Fred Willamson and Melvin Van Peebles), amazing funk soundtracks (including James Brown, Marvin Gaye and Earth, Wind and Fire), and a stylish vision of action cinema. Here's an introduction to these famous black films, with all their problematic and progressive content, the social and political context at the time, and how it ties into later films like Boyz n the Hood.