That Medved book has some great bits to it, but overall it sucks. It's full of inaccuracies and second hand information masquerading as fact. I'm not sure who's put up the quotes here and attributed them to the film, but a few of them ("I'll feed him his ass in pieces") are straight from the Medved book and are misquotes anyway. On a related topic, they called "Scream Blacula Scream" the worst Blaxploitation Film of all time in the Golden Turkey Awards book, beating "Blackenstein". Now I wouldn't mind if it was an honest review, but their write up of Blackenstein was so far off the mark it was untrue. Amateurs.
"I know it and you know it. Yellow Dog doesn't even know what town he's in."
Trouble Man is actually better than it's given credit for----it's definitely not "the worst movie of all time". It's a pretty good crime action thriller starring Robert Hooks, who's pretty good as the title character who's like a jack-of-all-trades of his community (and who's not a criminal himself, but knows how to move amongst criminals on the streets) who dosen't back down from fighting the bad guys when he has to. It's also fun to see Ralph Waite, known best for playing on the Waltons family series, playing a straight-up evil thug rolling with his own crew of thugs. I hate how this film usually gets dismissed and only mentioned because of the classic hit song called "Trouble Man" which is from the film's soundtrack---the only one Marvin Gaye ever did for a film, simply because it's been labled a "blaxploitation" movie. It's a pretty good above average B-film directed by a black director (Ivan Dixon) and definitely worth seeking out, since it's not an actual exploitation flick, and is pretty respectful of its characters.
I also like the funky instrumental tune from the Trouble Man soundtrack called "Mr. T Plays It Cool", which I only found out about when I heard a sample of it from a song called "A Touch of Jazz" by Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince off their second album. Its unique sound comes from the fact that Gaye played the entire song on a synthesizer, which was unusual for that time. The whole soundtrack is pretty good, though.
I agree, certainly a good film with a great score. Mr T was smooth as hell and the pool playing great. I also enjoyed all the familiar faces including the Walton’s guy.