- Year
- 1974
- Country
- USA
- Runtime
- 87 min
- Director
- Robert Clouse
- Updated
- 9 Aug 2026
- Obscurity
- cult (41/100)
Black Belt Jones
Jim Kelly karate-chops the mob to save a Watts dojo. Blaxploitation meets kung fu, joyfully.
Jim Kelly, fresh from Enter the Dragon, headlines this fusion of blaxploitation and kung fu, playing a martial-arts master who defends a Watts karate school from the mob. It is fast, funny and built entirely around Kelly's charisma and afro, climaxing in a fight in a car wash full of soap suds.
Made by Enter the Dragon's director Robert Clouse, it delivers exactly what the pairing of genres promises. Light, energetic and enormously likeable, it is the definitive blaxploitation martial-arts crossover.
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