SHORT TAKES

COOLEY HIGH (AIP) :: Billed as a black American Graffiti, which it's not, Cooley High is the best black movie since Claudine, but it's convincing for different reasons. Where James Earl Jones and Diahann Carroll made you believe they were sickeningly sweet, the characters in this flick ride high (with laughs and a great Motown oldies soundtrack) on the contradictions between being sweet and nasty, without once convincing you they are either.