Hell Up in Harlem – 1973
Director
Larry Cohen

Writer
Larry Cohen

Cast
Fred Williamson
Julius Harris
Gloria Hendry

Review by Wayne Malin

Pretty terrible but never dull,

This film is a direct sequel to “Black Caeser”. The first 7 minutes show the ending of the first film in which Caeser (Fred Williamson) was being chased and then beaten to death. This movie conveniently ignores that he was killed and has his father rescuing him. He survives and kills all the people that double-crossed him. He then tries to go legit…but his past won’t stay away.

The first movie was dull and stupid–it just had some violence and a good performance by Williamson to keep it going. This sequel was made quickly (it shows) and is REAL stupid–but it’s never dull. The plot moves very fast and there’s tons of violence and plenty of blood. All the violence is pretty funny–it’s ineptly staged and obviously faked with some hilariously bad post dubbing. The acting is bad except for Williamson and this actually left room for another sequel (which thankfully never happened).

This is a pretty bad movie but I was never bored–all the action and violence kept me entertained. If you liked the first you’ll probably like this. I give it a 5.