COONSKIN

US, 1975, 100 minutes, Colour.
Barry White, Charles Gordone, Philip Michael Thomas.
Directed by Ralph Bakshi.

Coonskin is yet another animated feature by Ralph Bakshi. He acquired fame with his scurrilous satire, Fritz the Cat and its sequel, Heavy Traffic, in which he blended real-life film with animation. This is the style of Coonskin.

Two prisoners make their escape from a jail. In the meantime the older prisoner is telling a story to the younger one, which seems to anticipate the action of the animated part of the film. It is a heavy satire on the crime films of the seventies, the gangster films and the Mafia films especially The Godfather, which it directly parodies. Bakshi is not afraid to give gross emphasis to particular aspects of his theme and does not always go for subtlety. His style of animation is very vivid and the overall effect is arresting, even if it is not particularly palatable. He moved to a much more wide approach to his audiences in his next film, the science fiction parable, Wizards.

1. The overall impact of the film? For whom was it made? An American audience, African American audience? The effect on each?

2. The blending of live action and animation? The effect?

3. Comment on the style of animation, realistic style, symbolic, comic strip and style?

4. The African American atmosphere, the reference to the title, language and idiom, music?

5. How could the film be seen as a fable? A moral tone (amoral tone and point?)

6. The focus on the preacher, the purpose, the film framed with him,'? His place in the fable?

7. The real life? The two men, the telling of the story? The purpose of the story, foreboding? making the men
more desperate for escape?

8. The hero, in prison, black, the black situation and oppression, prejudice? The need for self-assertion?

9. The presentation of the hero as conventionally tough and self-assertive, the women, violence, crime? The attention to detail in this career? Enhanced by the animation and the effects of the animation?

10. His assistant, the friendship, the gap, the setup for the betrayal?

11. The portrayal of women in the film, prostitutes? Relationships between men and women?

12. The presentation of the police and the satire on police films? The creating of the scene and the self-assertion and victory of the hero?

13. The portrayal of the gangsters’ scene and satire on gangster films? The detail of atmosphere?

14. The satire on the Mafia especially on The Godfather? The satire on the effeminate sons of The Godfather? The setting of the scene, the violence, the victory, the hero?

15. The emphasis of the film that the black man wins out over all in such a corrupt world?

16. A parable for the African American situation in a corrupt America?