Though technically she got her start as a 'Meyer girl' with a small role in Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls, statuesque Pam Grier first came to the attention of the drive-in crowd of seventies cinema buffs through her performances in a couple of rough and tumble women in prison films, namely The Big Doll House and Women In Cages, both produced by Roger Corman. From there, it only made sense that when the blaxploitation movement was kicked into high gear by the success of Gordon Parks' Shaft around the same time in 1971 that she make the transition. The infamous American International Pictures, headed up by Sam Arkoff, was there to help her along and before you knew it, the two genres were combined in Black Mama, White Mama. American International knew they had a star on their hands, after all, Grier had that one thing you can't learn that ought to make you a star - screen presence. They were wise enough to cash in on her looks and her attitude by casting her as the star in a few of their better known blaxploitation films, three of which were released on DVD a couple of years ago by MGM. Those three discs have been bundled up and tossed in a nice package with a fourth bonus disc and been aptly re-dubbed the Fox In A Box collection – and that's what we have here…

Coffy (1973):

In a star making role, Pam Grier plays the titular Coffy, a woman who makes her living as a nurse but who soon turns to the streets with a taste for revenge. You see, Coffy's sister got hooked on drugs and now lays in a coma, her fate unknown. Coffy starts nosing around, trying to find the bastards responsible for all of this, and using her feminine whiles has very little trouble luring the male pushers into her web.

She starts on the lower level of the criminal ladder, seducing a pusher into coming to her bedroom with her and then removing him of his head thanks to her trusty shotgun. His driver, who was along for the trip, is forced to inject himself with a lethal dose of smack, ending his life in a completely fitting way. From there, Coffy makes a few calls to her cop friend, Carter (William Elliott), who finds out he's got some serious problems of his own when it comes to light that his partner, who just happens to be a honky, is on the mob's payroll and cannot be trusted.

Through some of Carter's information and contacts, Coffy finds out that the head of the criminal organization that sold the dope is a man named Vitroni (Allan Arbus). He makes his way to the top of her hit list shortly before Coffy and Carter get the crap kicked out of them by two armed goons whose faces are hidden by ski masks. With Carter incapacitated, Coffy knows she's going to have to get Vitroni on her own, but how? Thankfully she's able to find out from a hooker with a heart of gold that her pimp, known only as King George (Robert Doqui), is also on Vitroni's payroll and he might be able to lead her to the man in charge if she plays her cards right. Coffy decides to infiltrate George's inner circle by using her insurmountable charm and sex appeal to convince him to hire her as one of his hoe's. He agrees and soon Coffy's plan kicks into high gear and not a single dope pusher or mobster will be left standing if he should be so foolish as to get in her way…

Slick, stylish, and completely over the top, Coffy is the cream of the crop as far as exploitation movies go. Jack Hill keeps the action moving fast and furious and Pam Grier shows considerable aptitude for nailing the tough and sexy role that her character requires. She's simultaneously sexy, scary, and cool all at the same time and it's no wonder after seeing her in this film that she became the 'blaxploitation it girl' shortly after it opened. When you're tasked with playing the kind of tough female character who can pull a razor sharp comb out of her afro, you've got to have a certain amount of natural cool in order to be able to pull it off without looking like a joke, and Grier does it perfectly here. Though the film was obviously made with a low budget, Hill does a fine job of hiding it thanks to some slick cinematography and a perfectly jazzy score that highlights the action, the violence, and the sex all quite nicely. Look for Sid Haig of The Devil's Rejects in a small role as one of King George's thugs.

Foxy Brown (1974):

With the success of Coffy, could a sequel be far behind? Not at all! In fact, it was there behind them all along, but a few rewrites later and a few studios decisions ended up making Hill and Grier's follow up film its own vehicle and not a direct sequel as was originally intended. The characters of Foxy Brown and Coffy don't differ much though, and you can see how it would have worked either way.

This time round, Pam plays Foxy Brown, is a woman who has found true love in the form of an undercover narcotics agent named Michael (Terry Carter), but this being a revenge film and all, it doesn't take long at all before he's been gunned down and put to death. Her brother Link (Antonio 'Huggy Bear' Fargas) finds himself in some serious hot water as well. Foxy won't take this type of thing lying down, so she picks up her gun and decides to hunt down the killers and get her revenge. After putting out word, she finds out some details about the crime ring responsible for the murder and decides to use her figure as an in, pretending to be a hooker so that she can get closer to her targets.

What Foxy didn't figure on was just how big this crime ring really is – these aren't small time dope dealers she finds herself involved with but a highly organized and very efficient gang of cold blooded murderers with plenty of connections downtown and at city hall. That won't stop her from getting the bastards back, however, and soon enough she's got her guns blazing and the bodies start piling up around her.

Sid Haig shows up in this one as well, in a small role as a bad guy. It's interesting how he's so easy to spot now that his image has been made so famous by his work in Rob Zombie's films. Again, Hill keeps the action moving along briskly, even more so than in Coffy and Foxy Brown is all the better for it. The movie is tense, fast paced, and quite exciting and filled to the brim with plenty of quality seventies style sex and violence. None of it is even remotely realistic and it's all quite cartoonish but that doesn't diminish how much fun the movie turns out to be.

Once again, Grier steals the show and exhibits that tough kind of sex appeal that we've come to expect from her. While the script might not really be giving her a whole lot to work with in terms of challenging characterizations or complex motivations, she aptly delivers the tough dialogue and violent set pieces without breaking a sweat. A great soundtrack by Willie Hutch keeps things bumping and grinding from start to finish, making Foxy Brown even more of a classic than it already is.

Sheba, Baby (1975):

The only PG rated film in the set is also the least interesting on a technical level and on an exploitative level as well. This time out, directorial duties are handled by the late William Girdler, the man behind Abby and Grizzly. While a decent director in his own right, his entry in the set lacks the over the top menace that made Hill's movies as much fun as they were. Sheba, Baby is not without its moments, however…

Grier plays a private investigator named Sheba Shayne who gets a call from her father (Rudy Challenger) when he needs her help. It seems that the small town in Kentucky she grew up in is having some pretty serious problems with the local mobsters and they're set on moving in on her dad's legitimate loan business.

Sheba shows up, ready for action, and the mobsters welcome her with a car bomb, setting the stage for what's she's about to dish out to them. Sheba starts to fall for Brick (Austin Stoker), her father's business partner, and together they're going to have to fight with all they've got to keep the dirty mobsters from stealing from them what they've worked so hard to build up.

While the action is there, the film doesn't go nearly as far as the first two movies in the set do and that's a shame, as there are scenes where it looks like it's trying to. There are allusions to sex and violence but most of what happens is off screen or simply implied. Explosions and gun battles are there, but they're not on the same level as they were in Coffy or Foxy Brown. It all feels very luke warm.

That being said, Grier is quite good in the lead, and it's fun to see D'Urville Martin show up as one of the heavies. It plays with the formula that made the first two movies so good but fails to deliver what audiences wanted out of these films – sex and violence. As crass as that sounds, when you remove the exploitation out of an exploitation picture, you more or less neuter it. There are moments in here where Grier shines, but the story doesn't give her much to do.

Video:

Each of the three features are presented in 1.85.1 widescreen and Sheba, Baby and Foxy Brown are enhanced for anamorphic sets (Coffy, sadly, is not). For the most part, all three features look very good on DVD. Sheba, Baby does look slightly worse than the other two features as it has a bit more print damage and slightly heavier grain but overall the pictures are clean and quite colorful across the board. Black levels stay pretty strong and there aren't any problems with mpeg compression artifacts. Some mild edge enhancement is definitely there, as is some mild aliasing, but other than that all three movies look good, just no perfect.