A Low Down Dirty Shame

After kick-starting his career with the blaxploitation parody I'm Gonna Get You Sucka, Keenen Ivory Wayans went on to pay sincere tribute to the genre with A Low Down Dirty Shame. In addition to writing and directing, he stars as Shame, a disgraced ex-cop who's forced by a crime cartel to hand over a femme fatale. Although Wayans does throw in some unexpectedly self-deprecating moments, Shame's heroics are nearly super-cool enough to be in a sci-fi film. Rampant narcissism and mean-spirited violence have never really gone out of style, but Low Down still comes across as a credible anachronism — and almost single-handedly redeems the '70s revival. B