What's this particularly cult cult-film shot in Chilltown?
80-minute film stops on Route 440
By D. Menzies
In a dour time, people want good news. You may be in a place with a ridiculous cost of living amounting to squat (particularly behind redlines, anyway), but then you find out the cult classic comedy, “Pootie Tang,” had scenes shot in ole Chilltown.
Isn’t one more potential stop for the JC Small & Big Screen Tour good news?
Wait. There is no JC Small & Big Screen Tour? Well, possibly when someone from a declining family of aristocrats puts it together to fund some pocket change, this 2001 film would be on it — at a location that probably doesn’t have a high-rise luxury apartment unit in front of it or in the background as of yet. For somewhere I don’t think is redlined in the historical sense, that feels new. And “Pootie Tang,” mess that it is, is also notable for some interesting ideas floating around in it that still feel new too.
Based on a character from the bygone weekly late night show “The Chris Rock Show,” the eponymous hero’s movie is part-Blaxpoitation film and part-goofball comedy. The end-result works more in the the latter category than the former. As a sort of modern Blaxpoitation film, it would be eclipsed by “Undercover Brother” (2002) and “Black Dynamite” (2009) — both of which got to be far more developed ideas-wise.
“Pootie Tang” has a runtime just over 80 minutes that reflects how cobbled together it was after a half-baked development process. In that runtime, a thin thread of a plot weaves the characters through an arc:
The movie’s framework involves Pootie being interviewed by sportscaster Bob Costas about a film based on his life. Pootie is a living urban legend — a music artist, cobbler and vigilante who utilizes (and seems super-empowered by) what he considers the mystical belt his father gave him; it’s the same belt his father (played by Chris Rock in one of three parts in the film) used to disclipline and sway Pootie from any wrongdoing with, and in one reaction of the movie I’ve watched, the viewer naturally attributes this element of how Pootie was raised as being par for the course for him being so virtuous … which is a sad kind of funny.
But I digress. Pootie Tang also speaks in a vernacular that, according to Wikipedia, “vaguely resembles pidgin.” He’s mostly unintelligible to the audience, though everyone in the movie’s universe understands him perfectly. Actor Lance Crouther, who plays Pootie Tang, is fairly endearing in the role. Pootie is supposed to be the coolest person on the planet, but is so through a lens that may be mocking the idea of cool in general. Pootie, for instance, decides to save a musical project by silently emoting in the booth, resulting in a hit track. But he doesn’t always seem to be able to say exactly what he wants to get across … which probably would be imposisble if all you wanted to do was sound cool.
Mostly Pootie’s voice, however it came to be, is his own, and a public service ad in which he discourages people in his community from consuming addictive junk is so successful, LecterCorp., concerned by the dive in profits, tries to hire Pootie Tang as their spokesperson.
It was on a recent viewing of “Pootie Tang” (my first beyond having seen some bits and pieces) where I noticed the Chilltown-locale. The spot where a LecterCorp representative played by Dave Attel meets with Pootie is an urban landscape along a busy road where overgrown weeds spill out from chainlink fences. Add graffiti and you have what looks like some part of Jersey City (RT 440, apparently). Other filming locations include NYC. But this scene near a highway fits with a densely populated place that looks much less so only when compared to NYC foot traffic. Yes, the urban crossroads where Pootie refuses to sell his soul seems to be a JC-locale, and with local anything taken into context, it’s like being able to give back the $75 dollars in a manilla envelope a lawyer drops in a certain game.
“Pootie Tang” could be the thinnest version of any well-funded small or big screen project that shares a similar plot. The antagonists are not particularly distinct takes on over-the-top villians, even when they have good actors behind them like Reg E. Cathey, Jennifer Coolidge and Robert Vaughn — who as LecterCorp’s boss essentially plays “The Man.” When Vaughn’s character can’t control Pootie, he breaks his spirit and makes “Pootie Tang” copies, some of whom are employees in Black-face, to be “Pootie Tang” for his company instead.
“Undercover Brother” and later “The Boondocks” would go on to have their protagonists facing off with versions of “The Man” undermining (redwalled) Black minds in ways that delved a bit more deeply into the effect and society at large. All of the projects mentioned in this piece are either a comedy in — or influenced by — the Blaxpoitation mold; they’re also mostly by Black voices using their “genre”-heavy mediums to tell stories in ways they’d struggle to otherwise. This has been the strength of using specifics genres in general.
In their recent review of “Sinners,” podcasters Hayley and Kayli also talked about how Black American trauma is portrayed in movies — with Hayley quoting from an essay that suggests society may like narratives focused on Black oppression because the victory the films usually represent, the overcoming of racism, indicate that the struggle is over rather than present. The discussion brought up interesting things about a need for Black escapism in storytelling. The idea that segments of society prefer a post-race narrative, which was part of the liberal side of the generally “Go capitalism, go!” neoliberalism dream, means stories about the challenging aspects of the modern Black experience would seem to be far less marketable than stories which, by a post-racial societal lens, reinforce the idea that things are either fine or part of a status quo that’s evolved as much as it can.
“Pootie Tang” can still be counted as one of a small handful of modern-era movies offering — if only inadvertently — something kind of new with a Black protagonist.
Part of the cult appeal of “Pootie Tang” is an affection for the way he talks that seems genuine — as its Wikipedia entry notes, pidgin is usually looked at in a lens that looks down on it, rather than at it — and if I’m being optimistic, slightly baffling.
If taken at face-value, someone on the thenarratologist.com just appreciates Pootie Tang’s quotes because they’re apparently very positive:
“‘Wa da tah!’ – This quote reflects Pootie Tang’s carefree and laid-back attitude towards life.”
Can people unironically be that enamored with what, out of the context of the movie, is “(positive) gibberish”?
Some people would call that question rhetorical.
Thenarratologist.com is not alone in seemingly appreciating “Pootie Tang” just for the positivity. I’m not sure if some of the other sites that list its quotes are written by AI (one of which has Pootie Tang quotes where he speaks normally except for referring to himself in the third-person …) because other people leaves comments on YouTube videos that amount to appreciating “Pootie Tang” as a carefree, “from left field” comedy.
When the movie is mean in a Blaxpoitation mold, it’s not particularly mean. With a pit-stop in Chilltown, “Pootie Tang” makes some valid points about appropriation for people to take or leave in its world that wants you to take it the least bit seriously — unlike a branded copy of its protagonist might.
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JC-area’s deeper screen cuts: No Reagan, Miss Marvel or Futurama’s “There’s no bus to Jersey City!”
Yes, one of the key instigators of “trickle down” economics played a soldier from Jersey City in the 1942 World War II film “Desperate Journey,” but many people in Jersey City and around the country could be better off without that system thick in the air now, so what else do we have that takes place in or references the city?