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Reviews
The Woman King (2022)
A Not-Oversimplified film on African Slave trade
The movies weaknesses are some of it's technical aspects. The direction is just ok and the editing at best does it no favors. The fight scenes in particular were essentially uninspired and typical, and over edited. For the first third or so, I couldn't always make out a word at time like the sound mix was bad, though could always be the theater sound system itself. I also felt the runtime a bit, which for a guy who loves The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Rober Ford is saying something. Maybe lose 15 min, mostly 1 unnecessary sub plot. The aforementioned editing didn't help in this area either.
It looked like much of the outdoor photography at least was shot Africa, big plus. The actors are all in. Boyega nails his part without overdoing it as a king. The main warrior women are interesting and very distinguishable. All did terrific jobs and sell being great warriors, especially the ones playing veterans. They all seem invested and help make the movie worth it.
Big positive: if you're looking for a movie going for woke points, this isn't the movie for you, meaning go see it. You'll learn something. The main conflict is dealing directly with the internal problem of Africans slave trading other Africans. It's the main point. Even the 'good guy' tribe is dealing with having sold its own, and are the good guys because they desire to turn from that path, not because they are unrealistic flawless idealists.
The white slavers do play a small part, and are Portuguese slavers from Brazil; another welcome touch.
The realistic way they dealt with the issues is the film's saving grace and it deserves to be seen to show Hollywood that black actors deserve more than to be randomly chucked in as Achilles or Nordic chiefs for social points. Plus, negatives aside it is pretty good and worth seeing. Give this film your money, it deserves it.
Ich seh, Ich seh (2014)
Has a lot going for it until it undoes itself completely
Plenty of technical merit here, and I even though they blatantly give up the 'twist' in the first several minutes like amateurs i was still very much into it's slow but very well edited pace. Until an unbelievable moment during the final stretch by the mother that had me laughing at her ridiculousness, and in the bad way, undoing all that came before it; and I realized the technically skillful buildup really led to nothing of substance whatsoever. Another critically overrated film as they decide to apparently ignore ridiculousness and narrative unbelievability for apparent art's sake. Similar to A Quiet Place and It Comes at Night but not nearly as aggregious. Overall, this was better than both combined.