Lord Shango (The Color of Love) is a film of the Blaxploitation era of film-making that luckily doesn't quite live up to the banner of the genre. This film feels like an Oscar Micheaux film in color; with an all African American cast, dealing with struggles in a small African American community, relationships between men and women, coping with the Christian religion and an African past, there are even African archetypes, etc. The story is about a young woman, Billie, grieving over her non-Christian/pro African Yoruban religion lover, Femi, being accidentally murdered by members of a local church when he objects and interferes with her Christian baptism ceremony. After she grieves for him, she believes she sees him in the body of her mother, Jeannie's current boyfriend, Memphis. It seems that Memphis is either overcome with the spirit of Femi or by his own lust and he ends up copulating with Billie. Billie runs away and when Jeannie realizes the truth of what happened she kicks Memphis out of her home and life as well as the church that supports him. Jeannie desperately wants her daughter back and through the support of a local drunk/trickster character named Jabo, she goes to the Shango worshipers and gives sacrifice to that effort. When the daughter returns, very pregnant, the two women use sacrifice again to set their worlds right. Billie ends up giving birth, leaving the baby behind and going off to heaven with her dead lover Femi and Jeannie ends up with the baby and with Jabo, who is actually Shango in the flesh. There are a lot more intricate details and twists and supernatural elements, too various to mention here, but the film is an interesting attempt to elevate African Yoruban religion on a equal footing if not higher footing than the Christian religion. Really wonderful gospel singing in it too.
Review of Lord Shango
