Melvin Van Peebles

How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It) -- Part icon, part iconoclast, Melvin Van Peebles is a filmmaker with a history that's as fascinating as any of his motion pictures.

The Hebrew Hammer -- A Jewxploitation spoof in the vein of Shaft and Austin Powers, The Hebrew Hammer is the story of Mordechai, a handsome Orthodox Jew (a.k.a. the Semitic super stud!) hired by the Jewish Justice League after discovering that Santa's evil son -- who has come to run the North Pole after staging a coup with the help of a reindeer, Blitzen -- has plans to eradicate Hanukkah.

Part icon, part iconoclast, Melvin Van Peebles is a filmmaker with a history that's as fascinating as any of his motion pictures. This award winning documentary (full of rare achival footage and unforgettable backstage stories from Spike Lee, Mario Van Peebles, Gil Scott-Heron and others) is a carefully-crafted tale of how a young black kid from Chicago ended up making one of the most controversial movies in American history, Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, the film that sparked the Blaxploitation era in Hollywood. But the story hardly ends there. Director Joe Angio playfully traces Van Peebles' path from atom-bomb-ferrying Air Force pilot to French novelist to proto-rap singer to Wall Street options trader-- a remarkable journey that helps to explain where Sweet Sweetback actually got his song.

Part icon, part iconoclast, Melvin Van Peebles is a filmmaker with a history that's as fascinating as any of his motion pictures.

Part icon, part iconoclast, Melvin Van Peebles is a filmmaker with a history that's as fascinating as any of his motion pictures.

Godfrey Cambridge stars in this outrageous comedy directed by maverick filmmaker Melvin Van Peeples (Sweet Sweetback's Baad Asssss Song). Jeff Gerber (Cambridge) seems to have it all: a successful career, a nice suburban home, a progressive-thinking wife (Academy Award®-winner Estelle Parsons, Best Supporting Actress, Bonne and Clyde, 1967) and two cute children. But he's also a loud-mouthed racist who wakes up one morning to discover he's turned into a black man. The doctor's have no explanation and no cure for his sudden change. Suddenly, Gerber is a white bigot in black skin who has todeal with a shocked family, intolerant neighbors, cold shoulders at the office and a back seat on the bus!

This hilarious tribute to the Blaxploitation genre stars Adam Goldberg as Mordechai, an Orthodox Jewish "superhero detective" who joins the Jewish Justice League to stop the evil machinations of Damien (the always-wacky Andy Dick), son of Santa (Richard Riehle), who aims to wipe out Hanukkah from calendars forever. Mordechai and his sidekick, Esther (Judy Greer), enlist the aid of Mohammed (Mario Van Peebles), a superhero protecting Kwanzaa.

A Jewxploitation spoof in the vein of Shaft and Austin Powers, The Hebrew Hammer is the story of Mordechai, a handsome Orthodox Jew (a.k.a. the Semitic super stud!) hired by the Jewish Justice League after discovering that Santa's evil son -- who has come to run the North Pole after staging a coup with the help of a reindeer, Blitzen -- has plans to eradicate Hanukkah.

A skydiving instructor falls hard for one of his students.

Charlie Sheen delivers fast-paced excitement to this high-flying action-adventure! Sheen stars as Ditch Brodie, a daredevil skydiving instructor who falls hard when a sexy, mysterious beauty (Natassja Kinski) walks through his door looking for a lesson -- and apparently plunges to her death during a parachute jump! Suddenly, Sheen finds himself hurled headlong into a nightmare world of intrigue and deceit -- caught in a deadly game of cat and mouse with the Russian mafia! With pulse-pounding suspense and sensational skydiving, high-speed adventure doesn't move any faster than TERMINAL VELOCITY.

Try this flick for a new spin on the classic Western. A cadre of outlaws tear through the West, hell-bent on glory and revenge. But this time, the desperados are mainly black. Mario Van Peebles leads the gang (the great supporting cast includes Isaac Hayes, Woody Strode and Pam Grier, among others) in a fight against hissable villain Billy Zane.

A group of mostly black infantrymen return from the Spanish-American War with a cache of gold. They travel to the West where their leader searches for the men who lynched his father.