Directed by:
Ryan CooglerCinematography:
Rachel MorrisonComposer:
Ludwig GöranssonCast:
Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Sterling K. Brown (more)VOD (3)
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Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther” follows T’Challa who, after the death of his father, the King of Wakanda, returns home to the isolated, technologically advanced African nation to succeed to the throne and take his rightful place as king. But when a powerful old enemy reappears, T’Challa’s mettle as king—and Black Panther—is tested when he is drawn into a formidable conflict that puts the fate of Wakanda and the entire world at risk. Faced with treachery and danger, the young king must rally his allies and release the full power of Black Panther to defeat his foes and secure the safety of his people and their way of life. (Walt Disney US)
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You know the rhetoric. A Marvel fanboy yells at a DC fanboy for his heroes being anchored in reality. It is impossible to root for someone who is as rich as Bruce Wayne or as divine as Diana of Themyscira. Then, all of a sudden, the Marvel fanboy now has an African Atlantis starring the royal prince. Hmm.
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Last year, Marvel decided to try and make us laugh in theaters, which it did quite well, but I'm very glad that Black Panther isn't afraid to play on a more serious note. Again, there's some humor, but this time we get a Marvel movie that's much more personal, serious, and earnest. And it works brilliantly. Ryan Coogler manages to work cleverly with the characters, their traumas and motives, and as a result we have perhaps the best Marvel villain, one whose actions we can understand, relate to and respect. And then there's Wakanda itself, a visually stunning world full of colourful costumes, masks, music and a stylish combination of modern technology and African traditions. There are several "wow" moments here, and they appear both during the ordinary macho machismo of the unglamorous world, and in the elaborate action scenes. Towards the end, though, it all gets a little out of hand and we get a perhaps unnecessary wildness. But the result is still an excellent Marvel film that attempts to test whether audiences would be able to stomach a comic book movie that's a little more serious in addition to the already slightly corny antics. Personally, I appreciate this approach much more than the goofing around in Thor.
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It's definitely not the best Marvel film, and a big role in the hype is played by the political level which, btw, sounds perfectly fine to me, like when a black boy from the Ghetto tells you a fairy tale that he has been hearing since childhood. T'Challa is a remarkably humble figure by MCU standards - Tony Stark stripped of vice and infected with a mixture of Shakespeare and the Lion King. It's magically naive and refreshing, because unlike other Marvel films, Black Panther is really devoted to its characters and, for example, the villain played by the charismatic Jordan is better depicted here than most of his competitors. Black Panther in turn shrinks the MCU world and curtails it by a cosmic dimension. In fact, it only deals with very familiar and current problems, and as a result, it feels like an even bigger fairy tale and escapism. In a way, Coogler concluded his black trilogy, which creates the figures of black saints. In Fruitvale, his efforts were undermined by social realism and in Creed by a lot of clichés, whereas Black Panther feels like his most convincing film, despite all of its problems with tempo and tricks. It's a pity he doesn't have a slightly sharper edit and a greater use of the hip hop soundtrack. Otherwise, this textbook Afrofuturism is really a very pleasant companion. A film that believes in a better world and that the super-protagonist is sometimes the one who just does something selflessly for the community. Political correctness? I say common sense.
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Black hasn't been this cool in a long time. The boys and girls at Marvel seem to have understood that a watered-down save-the-world story with a ton of visual effects best applied to the destruction of a major American city wouldn’t hold up again, or at least not until the next Avengers (who imho pull a slightly different strand of entertainment). So they decided to be smart about it and use the current geopolitical issue of refugees to their advantage, and crammed national and racial disparities into a cool heroic story full of moral values and fine ideas, spiced it up with a healthily ambitious plot. It might not be the best Marvel flick, because Avengers, with Captain America will pummel it with all those cool dudes and a plethora of TOP figures on one set, but it is certainly one of the smartest comic book movies. Plus, with heroes who, strangely enough, don't want to destroy the world, but to liberate it.
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I hope I won’t be called a racist if I express my contentment with a film where the only white guys are two Hobbits ;). The rather serious and the comment-on-world-problems style suits the Panther, it is clear that the roots lie in the Civil War which reemerges here. Coogler knows how to take the right stance and Michael Jordan’s Killmonger cashes in on this in an interesting variation on the anti-hero. Boseman just reinforces his position after his great debut in the third Captain and his T’Challa scores him points at his home (the great storyline about his sister). A leisurely start up with an excellent chase in South Korea easily beats the opulent fight in the finale, which maybe unnecessarily relies on the tried and tested. It certainly won’t disappoint – it just won’t surprise. The visuals are fantastic. Wakanda is fantastic and I can’t wait to take another look at her. The music by Ludwig Göranssonon is a chapter in itself, bristling with Africa and beating to modern black rhythms. Luckily there is just a bare minimum of rap and generally don’t disturb. WAKANDA FOREVER!
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Photo © Marvel Studios
![Black Panther - Photos](http://image.pmgstatic.com/cache/resized/w663/files/images/film/photos/165/461/165461495_03e6c8.jpg)
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