Cotton Comes to Harlem

Cotton Comes to Harlem (1970) is a landmark American crime comedy you can watch online on iFILM, directed by Ossie Davis with Godfrey Cambridge and Raymond St. Jacques as detectives Gravedigger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson — two Harlem cops who have seen everything and still manage to be surprised by the Rev. Deke O'Malley's audacious swindle.

O'Malley is raising cash from the Black community under the banner of a "Back to Africa" scheme — money that vanishes into a bale of cotton and suddenly has the mob, Black radicals and the NYPD all scrambling through Harlem's streets at once. One of the earliest blaxploitation films, Cotton Comes to Harlem works as a fast-moving caper and a sharp piece of social satire at the same time. Davis gave the genre its blueprint. Stream Cotton Comes to Harlem online on iFILM.