Greased Lightning
Dir: Michael Schultz
1977
****
Greased Lightning is the extremely likable true tale of Wendell Scott, a one time taxi driver turned Hootch runner and the first black stock car racing driver to win an upper tier NASCAR race. Richard Pryor plays Scott in one of his first and best performances of his acting career and the beautiful Pam Grier his wife. If that weren't enough, Beau Bridges gives the second best performance of his career in my opinion and the late great Cleavon Little co-stars as Scott's best friend. It is a tough film about America's troubled history regarding civil rights and it's a well rounded feel good film too. There is very little schmultz which I think helps the film a lot, it maybe the reason why it was never as popular as it should have been but the very subtle way that it shows that the country is still racist is very clever and I'm sure it offended all the right people. It's also got loads of great car chases, so there is very little not to love about it.