Drum

This film was supposedly based on the book of the same name by Lance Horner and Kyle Onstott. So much of it is far from the text. For starters, Blaise was never owned by Hammond Maxwell (in the book, he was owned by the mistress, who was Madame Alix, not Marianna). It was Drum's son, Drumson, that was purchased by Hammond Maxwell, not Drum (Drum had died sometime back from an attack by Blaise). Also there was a Chauvet family in the book, but they were the ones who owned Meg and Alph (Augusta's name was not Chauvet, but Devereaux (later mentioned as Delavan)). The book actually starts out in the very early 1800s, quite a bit before the movie. Drumson was killed in the uprising in the book (but not in the movie). This would have been a better movie if the screenwriters had followed the text more closely.

It's hard for me to imagine ANYONE not laughing nonstop throughout this exploiganza in which EVERY race/creed/sexual orientation is equally and cheerfully degraded. Previous posters on this howler nailed it by simply quoting great steaming piles of dialogue (incidentally, for the guy who wanted to know who could have been debased enough to finance and distribute such sleaze: who else but Dino di Horrendous??) It's as if David Selznick passed through gamma radiation and came out as John Waters. The kind of film where you wonder if those members of the cast now deceased are actually dead or just hiding out with Elvis, waiting for the radioactive half-life of this bomb to cool. Need I say it? MUST viewing!! Special Log Cabin Oscar to John Colicos for the most eye-rolling portrayal of a gay French slave trader yet seen in the cinema. Vive la merde!

Although a mediocre film, it showed the extent of racial discrimination in Louisiana in the past. Drum is a special black invented in the imagination of the film makers. On one hand he identifies discrimination, but on the other he tries to be a "good boy" with whites. When the revolt of slaves start he took the position of conciliation, which turned over when he saw his friend killed by whites. The end of the film is as incoherent as the drum's mother, a prostitute who had sexual relations with a beautiful black man.

Ha ha ha ha .....this movie was out there. Okay i'm a 31 year black male and a movie buff.I like movies good and bad, but a really love campy movies. Drum is now my favorite movie on all time!!!! The acting was terrible, the direction was worst,but i loved it!!! The plantation owner and his slutty daughter were the most outrageous characters in the entire movie...i love slavery movies or any movie set in the antibellum south..i saw mandingo and loved it!!!...i didn't even know drum existed until i saw it on late night cable tv. It was explicit,funny and probaly insulted half the viewing population! It was WILD and most of all POLITICALLY INCORRECT..WHICH IS WHAT FILMMAKING SHOULD BE!!!!!Most black people who watch this movie will probally laugh there ass off, I did! Those people who were offended, cool out. Its just really a fun movie.

Drum, in my opinion, was much more enjoyable than Mandingo. It's more an action film than a drama. Ken Norton gets to say more dialogue, even though he's still no actor. The big plus for Drum is that it's not as long as Mandingo. The cast delivers very bizarre performances, including John Colicos as Drum's evil gay ex-boss, and Warren Oates does well as Hammond Maxwell, although he doesn't have the same wickedness that Perry King portrayed him with in the first film. The final showdown, with the battle between black slaves and rich white people, plus the burning mansion, goes to show that there were some slaves in those days who were mad as hell and weren't gonna take it anymore! Rating: ***

Overall this is a fair film. Maybe not fair to history or the actors. Ken Norton asking Yaphet Kotto if he had let Sophie touch his snake was very amusing. The use of N word has to be at least a hundred times. I found the film to be in bad taste and not for any purpose other than to exploit. At the end Warren Oates makes a statement that sums up the whole film. He says that slaves are unpredictable sometimes, just like some kind of mad critter. ** out of *****

After reading all the reviews about this film, I was expecting either a sleaze-fest or a camp-fest (or both), but I was pleasantly (?) surprised. Although there are undeniably exploitational elements here (incest, castrations, torture), the director doesn't really linger over them. Nobody would mistake this for a thoughtful study on the mistreatment of black slaves in early 19th-century America, but it's a surprisingly well-made film, and the recreation of the period is just fine. The major weakness of "Drum" is that the male lead, Ken Norton, simply can't act; thankfully, Warren Oates and Yaphet Kotto certainly can. Pam Grier is wasted, however, and Colicos is positively ludicrous as a gay slave-trader. (**1/2)