Shaft (2000)

 The music is familiar, enticing, and electrifying, but this Shaft is not who he used to be. Most obviously, in the 2000 remake he's played by Samuel L. Jackson, not Richard Roundtree. He's leaner, meaner, than the old-school Shaft, who was consummately smooth, self-possessed and seductive. Jackson's Shaft is also bald. Without the fro and the side-burns, the new shaft just can't match up.

But realistically, that is not why Shaft (2000) is so much different from its original. Radical views of race and revenge make Jackson's Shaft far from the old-school version. In Shaft (2000) John Shaft arrests Walter Wade, Jr. for murdering a black man on account of his race. To make matters worse, the eye witness is paid to disappear and Wade jumps bail for Switzerland. Finally, Wade returns to face his trial, confident his father’s money, influence, and racial politics as a big business tycoon will guarantee an innocent verdict. Shaft goes on the search for the witness but Wade has plans to have her killed.

According to Bailey Henderson’s review at realmovienews.com, “John Singleton, Shane Salerno and Richard Price wrote the script for Shaft. In my opinion, the problem with the script was having too many ideas and visions between the three writers forced into a 100 minute script.” This is completely true and I would add that because of all the different visions and ideas in the film, it turned out to be a movie with no depth. In the old shaft there was no definite evil character, many could be justified but none could truly be pin pointed as the one true “bad guy.” This is one of the reasons why the old complex had depth and complexity. It also gave undertones of racial issues but never deliberately pointed it out to the audience. In comparison, the new Shaft had a definite “bad guy” and racial problems that were well known to the audience.  The new Shaft had more action and violence but no substance.