ALUMNI'S MOVIES | Super Fly

One of the most successful and iconic blaxploitation films of the '70s, Super Fly's power and continued relevancy come from more than Curtis Mayfield's excellent soundtrack.

Ron O'Neal plays Priest, a successful cocaine dealer (and user) sitting on $300k who wants to invest it all in top-of-the-line product to make "one last score" and walk away from the game with a million cash in the bank.

But there's no morality tale somehow - if anything a moral vaccuum, an existential bleakness. Priest, talking to one of his girlfriends, admits that he only hopes that a million dollars will give him the freedom that he might become happy.

Super Fly may seem to revel in earthly indulgences and racial stereotypes: coke, chrome, infidelity. Beneath that, though, it is heavy with a sense of meaninglessness, that, in the end, we hope Priest is able to escape.