Melinda (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: Aug 20, 2025
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Hugh A. RobertsonRelease Date(s)
1972 (July 29, 2025)Studio(s)
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: C
- Video Grade: A
- Audio Grade: A
- Extras Grade: D-
Review
For decades, Hollywood marginalized Black actors, relegating them largely to minor roles as servants and offering few opportunities for more significant parts, let alone leads. That changed dramatically in the early 1970s when a spate of movies popularly termed “blaxploitation” hit theater screens. These films featured lots of action, violence, and R-rated sex and were inexpensive to make. At first they were big hits mostly with Black viewers but soon attracted broad audiences, particularly after the success of Shaft (1971). Melinda is one of few blaxploitation films produced, written and directed solely by Black artists.
Frankie J. Parker (Calvin Lockhart), the morning drive DJ on a popular Los Angeles soul music radio station, is a self-assured, often arrogant narcissist enjoying his celebrity and flaunting his extravagant lifestyle. He has a modern bachelor pad where he entertains beautiful women, a fancy sports car to tool around town, and a designer wardrobe that he flaunts on his frequent visits to the city’s “In” clubs. Conspicuous consumption might as well be written on Frankie’s forehead.
His charmed life changes one day when he meets Melinda (Vonetta McKee), a recent arrival from Chicago. When Melinda doesn’t fall under the spell as other women have, Frankie pulls out all the stops to win her over. He wines and dines her and eventually takes her to a party on a yacht owned by his old friend Tank (Rockne Tarkington), an athlete who’s done well for himself. At the party, Frankie runs into his former lover Terry (Rosalind Cash), who’s still angry with him for philandering when they were together. By morning, Frankie realizes he’s in love with Melinda.
Unbeknownst to Frankie and Melinda, they were followed all evening by a shady character. It turns out that “Melinda” is an alias she’s using to evade a pursuer. Melinda was the mistress of Chicago mob boss Mitch (Paul Stevens), and he’s desperate to track her down because she has a cassette tape that implicates him in a high-profile murder. When Melinda is murdered in Frankie’s apartment, the mob assumes he was in partnership with her and has the cassette. Frankie is arrested but makes bail, thanks to Terry, and sets out to clear his name.
Handsome and with a swagger befitting the role of Frankie, Lockhart is the star but is far from a convincing actor. He postures rather than reacts naturally and relies too much on snappy dialogue, over-emphasizing words to drive the point home. As to the romance, there should be considerable chemistry between him and McKee but they never generate credible heat.
As Melinda, McKee looks beautiful and projects an air of mystery. In her scenes with Lockhart, her face and especially her eyes exude a combination of seductive charm and fear that allow us to see into her character’s soul. Aware of her precarious plight, McKee’s Melinda nonetheless retains an aura of ultra-coolness. Making the most of an eye-catching wardrobe, she’s reminiscent of 1940s femme fatales—beautiful women who lead men into danger. Melinda is a key figure in the plot but isn’t around very long.
Cash’s character, Terry, is the girl who still holds a torch for Frankie and comes to his rescue, immersing herself in deep trouble with bad people. Intelligent, glib, and cagey, she’s fully aware of Frankie’s flaws, dismisses his outward arrogance, and accepts him for what he is. The eventual damsel in distress, Terry’s a tough lady unafraid to buck the bad guys. Cash is an expressive actor who can project her character’s feelings with a simple glance or bit of body language.
Stevens’ Mitch, looking like a bank president, is a modern version of a mob boss—urbane, well-spoken, smart. Stevens doesn’t add quite as much venom to his portrayal as one might expect, but this may have been the point. Mitch is so sure of himself that he makes the mistake of underestimating Frankie. Mitch ultimately gets his comeuppance when Frankie doles out a brutal beating. A Black man triumphing over a white man on screen was pretty big in 1972.
The film marked the screen debut of Jim Kelly, who plays karate instructor Charles Atkins. There’s a nice action sequence late in the film when Atkins and his karate students—male and female—stage an ambush using their skills to surprise and neutralize an army of gun-toting thugs. Jim Kelly would star a year later opposite Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon.
With a predominantly Black cast, the film is democratic in portraying evil, cunning, and illegality from both Black and white characters. Frankie is a suave player who knows he’s a looker (he smiles approvingly in the bathroom mirror every morning) and a magnet for attractive young women. This cocksure manner isn’t exactly endearing, but audiences had rarely seen Black movie heroes like this—successful, rich, attractive, leading the good life. Affluent, self-confident Black characters were few and far between in an era when Sidney Poitier was the only certifiable movie star of color.
The plot device of Melinda is one that Alfred Hitchcock often employed—an innocent person is caught up in dangerous events by circumstances beyond his control. Melinda contains an interesting cast of characters that veer away from cliche, but director Hugh A. Robertson gives the picture a sluggish pace with an excess of exposition and lukewarm love scenes that go on too long. In terms of action, the film has only intermittent moments—not enough to drive the narrative. Working on a small budget, Robertson uses the streets and assorted locations in Los Angeles to highlight its urban setting, and manages to do justice to the screenplay by Lonne Elder III and Raymond Cistheri. Melinda is a lot tamer than later blaxploitation films, delivering relatively few action moments and discreetly shot sex scenes with nudity mostly hidden by shadows. Language is rough and includes typical street jargon of the time.
Melinda was shot by director of photography Bill Butler on 35mm film with Panavision cameras and spherical lenses, finished photochemically, and presented in the aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The Blu-ray from the Warner Archive Collection features a new 4K restoration sourced from the original camera negative. Clarity is excellent and doesn’t show the yellow cast common in other features from the 1970s. Complexions are rendered well. Frankie’s bright red Corvette convertible really pops, and his outfits reflect style and affluence. In one scene, production design displays an African motif—elephant tusks, mounted zebra head, stuffed giraffe. Men and women sport Afro hairdos, dating the film clearly to the early 70s.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 mono DTS-HD Master Audio. English SDH subtitles are an option. Dialogue is clear and distinct, and peppered with strong language and slang of the period. During fights, grunts, bodies being pummeled, furniture breaking, and general mayhem are heard. The bluesy score by Jerry Butler and Jerry Peters fails to match screen action and used so sparingly that opportunities are missed for it to amp up excitement in many scenes.
The only bonus material on the Blu-ray release from Warner Archive is the following:
- Original Theatrical Trailer (2:49)
Melinda combines crime, martial arts, romance, vengeance, jive talk, and action. Though reasonably entertaining, it lacks emotional punch and suffers from lapses in logic. A few scenes that emerge from nowhere do nothing to advance the plot or characterization and result in confusion. One scene, in which a thug eavesdrops while Frankie and Melinda are making love, is particularly tasteless.
- Dennis Seuling