He enters like a hurricane, the most confident human being we’re ever likely to see. He’s a man’s man, back before the term had toxic implications. On screen for less than a minute, he takes over the movie so completely, it’s hard to imagine he didn’t get his own sequel. Maybe the head cheese for a Blaxploitation revival. He is Big Dick Blaque, the baddest motherfucker in town, with a dash of French pretension to keep things honest. As played by the legendary Hal Williams, he’s so delightfully himself, so characteristically charged, he’s perhaps the one man on the planet who could look George C. Scott in the eye and call him a racist. He not only survives the encounter, he turns on his heel to fuck another day.
The film is Hardcore, Paul Schrader’s 1979 remake of The Searchers, that is, if Natalie Wood had been forced into prostitution by the Comanches and made a reluctant porno actress. Scott has seen his daughter on some grainy underground film (the scene, if we’re being honest, contains the single greatest expression of rage in the history of motion pictures), and with only a few clues, sets off to find those responsible for stealing his child’s innocence. General Patton let loose in the seedy underworld of LA’s adult film industry? Christ, Hardcore’s running time could eclipse von Stroheim’s uncut version of Greed and still not be long enough. As it is, it’s but a disappointing 108 minutes, with Mr. Blaque occupying a mere 57 seconds. But it’s enough. More than enough.
Naturally, because Scott knows that the man who fucked (raped) his daughter was white, BDB’s entrance into the seedy motel room is going to be met with a quick rejection. Instinctively, Blaque knows the score. This being America, it’s yet another job where the brother is the first one asked to leave. And please, cracker, don’t promise a call back. Why the hell you think he surrendered to doing sex work, anyway? He’s not about to stand in line at the factory again. And he’s far too proud for public assistance. He wants a goddamn job. And when you’re built like a Panzer, you’d expect that a few roles would land in your lap.
Consider the monologue, as good as anything penned by O’Neill or Miller:
“I’m Big Dick Blaque. I’ve done more porno movies than you ever saw. I’ve worked with Harry Reems, Johnny Wad. Not the type? I can cum ten times a day. I can keep it hard two hours at a time. I’m a woman’s dream. I got a dick hung on me nine inches long!”
The righteous indignation of a man who’s been repeatedly handed a crap sandwich and expected to smile. The roar of four hundred years, let loose on some creep in a bad wig and fake moustache. Can you blame him? When would such prowess not be exactly what’s called for? “This is bullshit!”, he shrieks, not for the last time. One can only hope that Scott tracked him down after finding his daughter to let him know the truth. Perhaps it would temper the breakdown to come. In a just world, he’d eclipse John Holmes and never look back. As it is, he’d have to settle for 227 on NBC.
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