Curtis Hook (Jim Brown) is part of a crew of robbers that steal money from the mafia. After their last heist, Hook is the last man standing so he hides the money and gets caught by the police. He is put behind bars, the last place a man suspected of stealing more than a million dollars from the mafia wants to end up. In the slammer, everyone tries to violently persuade him to give up the location of the money—the police, the mafia, as well as other gangs.
Considered by some a blaxploitation film and by others a B-movie through and through, The Slams definitely has elements of both, with Gene Corman—brother of legendary filmmaker Roger Corman—acting as producer and with former professional football player Jim Brown in the lead role. And the actor does a great job using his natural charm and athletic build to manifest a strong presence on screen, which is something that director Jonathan Kaplan also takes credit for. He used chess, which Brown loved to play, as a means of keeping the actor engaged in the project—by finding him opponents to play against in between takes, he presented the former football player with some form of competition on set. Jim Brown was also a vital factor in the casting of Ted Cassidy as the lead villain, because he wanted somebody physically imposing to challenge his character in the fight scenes. The director agreed.
In 1972 a neophyte Spanish media company created a rare platform for artists to explore classic genre imagery with a sophisticated cinematic sensibility.
After Peter Hyams made a successful TV movie called "Goodnight, My Love", producers Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler approached him with the desire of...
