Confusingly, 2000’s “Shaft” is not a remake of the 1971 original but rather a sequel. The movie follows John Shaft (Samuel L. Jackson “Pulp Fiction”, “Deep Blue Sea”), who is the nephew of the John Shaft played by Richard Roundtree (“Shaft”, “Se7en”). I felt that the original movie was a bit boring but this one is so much better in pretty much every conceivable way.

Shaft is a New York cop that arrests Walter Wade Jr. (Christian Bale “American Psycho”, “Batman Begins”) for a racially motivated murder but he has friends in high places and flees the country while on bail. Two years later, Wade returns to New York and Shaft catches him but again the justice system fails when he is granted bail. Shaft ditches the badge and decides to become a private detective to catch Wade.

Samuel L. Jackson brings a lot of attitude and personality to the role of Shaft. He does a great job here. However, the one who steals the show is Christian Bale as the sociopathic Wade that thinks he can get away with anything. Jeffrey Wright (“Casino Royale”) is okay as Hispanic gangster Peoples Hernandez. Richard Roundtree has a little more than a cameo as the original Shaft.

The best thing about the original “Shaft” was the theme sung by Isaac Hayes and it’s again used here in this movie. Now, we have the great music along with a good plot, some strong performances and some entertaining action sequences. I honestly do not know why this movie is not more popular considering how revered the original “Shaft” is in some circles. This is a great cop movie that is worth checking out. It was also directed by John Singleton (“Boyz N The Hood”) and you can feel some of the serious conversations about race bleeding into this one.