Humphrey Bogart is alive and well and living in Harlem. His skin is black, but he lives with it. His private eye affairs are still more quixotic than lucrative. His lip still curls when the police chief threatens to withdraw his licence unless he cooperates. Laconic, sardonic, and only just on the right side of the law, he is now called John Shaft…. Dark alleys and red herrings, exotic sirens and prowling gunmen, sinister encounters and strange alliances, all the familiar icons come tumbling out as e...

[Most] of our pictures with and about Negroes these days lack authentic black backgrounds and thinking—and are a disappointment. Instead of just making films with some Negro actors, the studios would be wise to begin their planning with Negro culture, realistic Negro themes, and then select their working staff who will make the picture and be in it. To the credit of Warner Bros.-Seven Arts they did just that in signing the famous photographer Gordon Parks to film his autobiographical novel, The Learn...

John Shaft, private eye, aspires to be a steely black version of Sam Spade but more closely achieves an ironic, dimpled James Bond. Shaft's Big Score … clearly is no "Maltese Falcon" or even a "Goldfinger."… [However, the film is] a rousing and entertaining thriller, better than the original and far superior to all those imitations that Shaft's success has spawned…. The film is directed with style and vigorous pace by Gordon Parks, who celebrate...

Shaft emerges in [Shaft's Big Score] as a highly lethal and effective weapon of destruction and not much else…. Gordon Parks directed and keeps things moving at great speed to cover up the picture's emptiness. There is a chase sequence at the end which borrows from all the other successful chase sequences with which we've been peppered of late.

[Shaft's Big Score] is a development rather than an imitation of the earlier film…. To a greater extent than its predecessor, Shaft's Big Score is a film which stands or falls on its elaborate production sequences, notably the lengthy climactic chase at the end of the film…. (p. 55)