How others will set it. Most viewers will enjoy the film. Some will be offended by certain scenes, but even those people will be appreciative, on the whole. No one should have the impression that the film appeals solely to a black audience, since there is strong crossover appeal.
How I felt about it. The film began relatively promising, as an interesting look at how difficult it is for a director to make a movie his way without using his own money to produce it. As Van Peebles becomes increasingly obsessed with finishing the movie, come what may, my opinion of Baadasssss! fell. Our hero writes bad checks, assaults his film editor, refuses to visit his falsely jailed film crew, forces his thirteen year old son to perform a sex scene, and bankrupts his family to make this longshot movie, his own exact way. Of course, if the movie didn't eventually become an indie success (this is based on a true story, the lead actor and director is the real-life son of the character), then Baadasssss! would not have been made in the first place.
The scene that bothered me most occurs when Van Peebles' white film editor annouces he's quitting. Van Peebles responds by punching the editor twice in the face, in addition to verbally berating him. The irony here is that a key scene in the movie within a movie has white cops beating a defenseless black suspect. Would Van Peebles have beat the film editor if he was a large black man instead of a physically passive white man? Earlier scenes do have their moments, however. Van Peebles takes his project to an independent producer, but walks out on him when he learns that the producer is gay. On the other hand, getting financing from a paranoid drug lord surrounded by fawning groupies doesn't ring any alarm bells.
It is also interesting that Van Peebles, who won't put on a suit to meet studio bigwigs when times are good, does put on the suit and charm to convince a theater owner to run his film as a standalone feature. Desperate times call for desperate measures, assault and battery hopefully not among them.