HW Pick: “The Guy From Harlem,” 1977 (video)

The Guy from Harlem is a blaxploitation film from 1977 about a temperamental yet ultimately quite sensitive gangster Harry De Bauld, a character you will grow to love, in this really, really funny movie directed by Rene Martinez Jr. (who is infamous for directing The Six Thousand Dollar Nigger in 1978 …

… it was later renamed “Super Soul Brother,” for obvious reasons, upon its video release during the early-80s VHS boom).

“Harlem is the experience playground of all people interested in becoming detectives,”

As you’d expect from the title, The Guy from Harlem is set entirely in Miami. It’s the story of private eye and titular Guy, Al Connors who works in Florida, but originally hails from Harlem.

At one point Connors explains seriously to one of his clients that “Harlem is the experience playground of all people interested in becoming detectives.” What I love is he never misses a chance to tell anyone and everyone where he hails from (“Tell your boss that nobody messes with the guy from Harlem!” being a favorite line), and it’s obvious that he’s very much in demand–as soon as he gets to his office and has some innuendo-laden banter with his secretary Sue, he receives a visit from his old friend from Harlem David McCloud, CIA Agent (ROCKING the pink leisure suit), who has a job that only The Guy from Harlem can handle. Al’s a man with such a reputation that when it’s time to protect an African queen/princess/wife of a chief of state (her title changes pretty much every time it comes up) the CIA goes straight to his dingy shag-carpeted office and begs for help. Later, when gangster Harry De Bauld’s daughter is kidnapped by the sinister Big Daddy, and his own criminal organization is just “too upset!” about the whole thing to deal with the situation, where do you think he goes? That’s right. To the guy who’s the best at being from Harlem there is, baby.