Shaft

Shaft is a 1971 film used as a model for blaxploitation films, but many debate whether it actually falls under the category of blaxploitation itself. It tells the story of a black detective, John Shaft, who travels through Harlem and to the Italian mob in order to find the missing daughter of a black mobster. It stars Richard Roundtree as Shaft, Moses Gunn, Charles Cioffi, Christopher St. John, Gwenn Mitchell and Lawrence Pressman. The movie was adapted by Ernest Tidyman and John D. F. Black from Tidyman's 1971 novel of the same name. It was directed by Gordon Parks.