When I recently came across comics writer (and Muppet screenplay scribe) Brian Lynch's
anecdote about how one Big Two company pitched a "lesploitation" detective series to him, I thought: "that would actually be pretty awesome … if that was a film written and directed by Jack Hill."
Jack Hill is probably most famous for his 1975 exploitation film
Switchblade Sisters, loosely based on Shakespeare's
Othello with all the principal players as girl gang members. (It's one of Quentin Tarantino's influences. As such, he helped to revive interest in Hill's films in the late '90s/early '00s.) I haven't seen all of Hill's 20 or so films, but I have seen
Switchblade Sisters,
Spider Baby (a gothic black comedy, starring Lon Chaney),[1]
Coffy, with Pam Grier (blaxploitation),
The Big Bird Cage (a Roger Corman-produced, women-in-prison picture, also with Grier) and
The Swinging Cheerleaders.
In all of the aforementioned films, it's clear that Hill has two great strengths: he is able to direct a picture that satisfies the requirements of a trendy (at the time) genre while at the same time subverting them and, in the films I just listed, nearly 100 percent of all of the heroes (and antiheroes) are women (and almost all of them are very, very sexy).[2] It is the latter quality that leads me to believe that his films can appeal successfully to both men and women. Here are some of the elements of Jack Hill films that, I think, could be adapted into genre comics (including superhero) that allowed him to have his cheesecake and eat it too:
1. He knew how to strike the right balance between making his heroines seem dangerous/vulnerable in his action scenes, usually by effective suspense. There's always a feeling that the character will
probably come out on top, but it's by no means assured. His characters fight dirty: they back up their brawn (and/or their feminine wiles, as the case may be) with a little brain. For example, one of the major set pieces in
Coffy is when Grier, as the main character, gets into a free-for-all with the women of a brothel. Now, in many ways it's a regular T&A fest, with large-chested ladies ripping off each other's tops, etc., except for two things: 1. this is all part of Coffy's elaborate plan to destroy the drug dealer that hooked her little sister and 2. in an earlier scene, the viewer has seen Coffy plant
razors in her
hair, so it's impossible to just focus on the sexy elements without anticipating the obligatory hair-pulling.
2. Hill's characters work outside of law and order, which is usually explicitly corrupt and represented by men. Men almost never come to the rescue of women in Hill's films.[3] Often, his heroines must operate outside the law to save themselves and/or obtain justice (
Coffy) and usually band together with other women (
Switchblade Sisters,
The Big Bird Cage,
The Swinging Cheerleaders). Women do fight over men in Hill's films, but usually it's part of a larger power struggle. Probably the closest that mainstream comics has come to this is Gail Simone's run on
Birds of Prey.
3. When I began writing this column, I didn't realize that fellow Comixology columnist Noah Berlatsky
had written a post on his blog about the way that Jack Hill handled rape in his films, but I find his comments pretty spot on.[4] It is notable, also, that Coffy fends off her potential rapist.
4. Hill knew how to showcase his actresses (and actors, especially frequent player Sid Haig) properly, and built around their individual strengths. (Even aesthetically: in his commentary to
Coffy, he explained how he had Pam Grier simply dressed, because her face and figure is so pretty, she didn't need anything to deflect attention away from it.) This may sound obvious, but does it really happen all that often, especially with superheroines? Not only are personalities mutable, but powers often are, too: witness Power Girl.
5. Jack Hill films are gritty, but not grim. Narratively, this distinction leaves room for betrayals, double-crosses, jealousy and other sources of dramatic conflict, but justice can also be done; spirits can remain unbroken; heroes still have a sense of right and wrong; a couple on the run can channel a romantic, Bonnie-and-Clyde type aura.
6. Occasional random, awesome silliness. At one point in
Switchblade Sisters, Maggie, as part of her initiation into the girl gang Dagger Debs, is tasked with stealing a medallion from the leader of a rival guy gang. While doing so, Maggie is trapped, and when it seems like she can't possible escape, she simply just
busts through a wall (obviously made of cardboard) and runs away.
7. Jack Hill's films are far from politically correct, but he uses that to his advantage: to have diverse characters, both ethnically and sexual orientation-wise, and to break ground. Let's face it: as long as mainstream comics are going to be politically incorrect (and as long as the likes of Frank Miller is running around, they're going to be) why not use that as a sort of freedom to tackle issues with some intelligence and wit?
Arguably, indy comics have a few Jack-Hill like contenders, such as Gilbert Hernandez and
Brian Maruca/Jim Rugg, the team behind Street Angel (who are consciously channeling exploitation film tropes), but it's too bad that mainstream comics universes aren't vast enough to save a little corner for such a creator, since, after all, isn't that what imprints such as Vertigo were created for?
Notes:
[1]Spider Baby is inexplicably being remade. But, without Lon Chaney Jr.'s poignant performance, I just don't see how it can be any good.
[2] Who, by the very demands of low-budget, exploitation filmmaking, were portrayed by visibly tough actresses.
[3] The notable exception to this would be Spider Baby. Lon Chaney, Jr. is a father figure, to be sure, but he is doing his best to save the brood of murderous children he's vowed to protect from the outside world, and his solution as to how to do this is a Pyrrhic victory, at best.
[4] The (off-screen) gang-rape in The Swinging Cheerleaders is problematic: it's not entirely defensible, but it does fall into the repressed paradigm.
Image credits:
Street Angel ©2005 Jim Rugg & Brian Maruca
From Gilbert Hernandez' "Shout Ramirez" ©2000 Gilbert Hernandez
Power Girl from Terra #4, written by Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti and drawn by Amanda Conner
Kristy Valenti currently works for The Comics Journal and Fantagraphics Books, Inc.
Uncharted Territory is © Kristy Valenti, 2008
