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Review - The Black Panther
Feb. 16th, 2018 09:52 amSo today is the official opening day for The Black Panther. I saw it the day before. There's only been a handful of films that I've seen prior to opening day or before the rest of the world gets to see them -- Back to the Future, Gross Point Blank, Parenthood, and now The Black Panther. The other three were in cleaner and far nicer movie theaters. This one was in a theater that was in a desperate need of updating. AMC 25 Empire -- if you want to do assigned seating for a big fan event -- do it in one of your nicer theaters. Seriously.
But.
It was by far the most innovative, ground-breaking and the best of the bunch. Granted they are all vastly different movies. As stated in previous post, I got a bag of popcorn (which I ate roughly half of), a coin (that I haven't examined), 3D Glasses (it was in 3D), and the movie was free because my friend was treating me. I hadn't seen her in a month and had actually made plans to see it with someone else -- but saw this as an opportunity to make a new friend. (She highly recommended the film "Call Me By Your Name" - said it was the best she'd seen all of last year, and she saw Shape of Water.) The movie theater itself was disappointing. No recliner seats (these are actually really difficult to find in NYC, believe it or not), skinny seats that were had to get out of. Did have plenty of leg room at least. And for a moment we worried about the facility's ability to show the film. Which, ahem, would have been embarrassing, since there were AP News Cameras in the theater showing the event. Also people had come in full costume.
But they fixed it. It had happened during the "Deadpool" trailer, people were upset. So the theater management re-ran the Deadpool trailer. As a result, a two hour movie turned into three hours. It started at 6PM, we got out of there by 8:30PM. I was home by 10PM. Lots of time spent writing on mass transit, because my muse woke up and decided it wanted me to write a story now. (And I spent at least three hours yesterday on Mass Transit.)
Anyhow, enough boring stuff.
This film blew me away. I went in with rather low expectations. I go into all superhero films with low expectations. They are after-all superhero films. There's a formula -- lots of white guys, a few token female characters in supporting roles playing either wives, mothers, siblings, all damsels that need to be saved. Sometimes they break that mold but often, no, the girl gets herself into trouble. Token black characters who are either the villains, the awkward helper/fish out of water role that Sam Jackson and Forrest Whittaker play in most of these films. Usually the white guy starts out weak and gets stronger, or he is strong and has to embrace his inner vulnerability. Also it's often about the United States and how great the US or Britain are -- promoting the English way of life.
That's most if not all superhero flicks. That was even Wonder Woman. I mean you sort of know this going in. It's hardly a surprise. Wonder Woman gets co-opted to join the white guy cause, and is surrounded by white guys throughout, falls for the lead white guy, and saves the world because of his sacrifice. In the end the movie was less about "Wonder Woman" and more about Steve Trevor, the white American guy who inspired her. While she came from a race of backwards Amazon Women, who lacked the technological innovations, science and knowledge of the white male world. Wonder Woman didn't change the formula, it didn't say anything new about the art form, it just pushed the old tropes forward a bit more. Re-establishing them in a new way. It was a comfortable white guy film about a hot and extremely strong white woman, who had featured in many of their fantasies. Don't get me wrong, I loved Wonder Woman. But I wasn't blind to its failings. It disappointed me. I thought it would change the genre, bring something new to it -- all it did was provide a movie with a female superhero and an anti-war message.
The other side, or what I normally expect from the counter-culture flicks, is a re-establishment of old tropes and racial/sexist bias. Buffy surprised me a little because it tried to break away from that and subvert many of those tropes, but in the end, I felt it stopped short of truly accomplishing that goal. Same with Wonder Woman. Also, with Luke Cage and Black Lightening, which both seem to re-emphasize the stereotypes. Black Lightening, as a co-worker stated, is basically the film version "Lean on Me" with superheros and Luke Cage is well, Shaft with superheroes. I've seen both done in cinema countless times. I was disappointed by both.
The Black Panther -- surprised me. It flipped every superhero flick I'd seen upside down and shot arrows through it -- and it did it subtly without any telling, all showing, and no descents into obvious parody or satire.
From the trailers, I thought, okay this looks like a busy movie with one too many chase scenes and no character development. I couldn't have been more wrong. Oh sure, there are plenty of explosions, fight scenes and chase scenes -- very long ones in fact.
But there's a lot more going on. This is a film that surprise, surprise actually has something to say, it goes above and beyond what superhero flicks do, and comments heavily on how we view race -- and our world, taking Wonder Woman's anti-violence message and exploding it in a way that the Wonder Woman flick never quite accomplishes.
( spoilers, not major, pretty vague, but cut in case people want to go in cold )
I loved this film so much. I'd be willing to see it again. There are so many layers. So much there.
Best superhero film ever, and considering the fact that I've seen practically all of them...
A+
But.
It was by far the most innovative, ground-breaking and the best of the bunch. Granted they are all vastly different movies. As stated in previous post, I got a bag of popcorn (which I ate roughly half of), a coin (that I haven't examined), 3D Glasses (it was in 3D), and the movie was free because my friend was treating me. I hadn't seen her in a month and had actually made plans to see it with someone else -- but saw this as an opportunity to make a new friend. (She highly recommended the film "Call Me By Your Name" - said it was the best she'd seen all of last year, and she saw Shape of Water.) The movie theater itself was disappointing. No recliner seats (these are actually really difficult to find in NYC, believe it or not), skinny seats that were had to get out of. Did have plenty of leg room at least. And for a moment we worried about the facility's ability to show the film. Which, ahem, would have been embarrassing, since there were AP News Cameras in the theater showing the event. Also people had come in full costume.
But they fixed it. It had happened during the "Deadpool" trailer, people were upset. So the theater management re-ran the Deadpool trailer. As a result, a two hour movie turned into three hours. It started at 6PM, we got out of there by 8:30PM. I was home by 10PM. Lots of time spent writing on mass transit, because my muse woke up and decided it wanted me to write a story now. (And I spent at least three hours yesterday on Mass Transit.)
Anyhow, enough boring stuff.
This film blew me away. I went in with rather low expectations. I go into all superhero films with low expectations. They are after-all superhero films. There's a formula -- lots of white guys, a few token female characters in supporting roles playing either wives, mothers, siblings, all damsels that need to be saved. Sometimes they break that mold but often, no, the girl gets herself into trouble. Token black characters who are either the villains, the awkward helper/fish out of water role that Sam Jackson and Forrest Whittaker play in most of these films. Usually the white guy starts out weak and gets stronger, or he is strong and has to embrace his inner vulnerability. Also it's often about the United States and how great the US or Britain are -- promoting the English way of life.
That's most if not all superhero flicks. That was even Wonder Woman. I mean you sort of know this going in. It's hardly a surprise. Wonder Woman gets co-opted to join the white guy cause, and is surrounded by white guys throughout, falls for the lead white guy, and saves the world because of his sacrifice. In the end the movie was less about "Wonder Woman" and more about Steve Trevor, the white American guy who inspired her. While she came from a race of backwards Amazon Women, who lacked the technological innovations, science and knowledge of the white male world. Wonder Woman didn't change the formula, it didn't say anything new about the art form, it just pushed the old tropes forward a bit more. Re-establishing them in a new way. It was a comfortable white guy film about a hot and extremely strong white woman, who had featured in many of their fantasies. Don't get me wrong, I loved Wonder Woman. But I wasn't blind to its failings. It disappointed me. I thought it would change the genre, bring something new to it -- all it did was provide a movie with a female superhero and an anti-war message.
The other side, or what I normally expect from the counter-culture flicks, is a re-establishment of old tropes and racial/sexist bias. Buffy surprised me a little because it tried to break away from that and subvert many of those tropes, but in the end, I felt it stopped short of truly accomplishing that goal. Same with Wonder Woman. Also, with Luke Cage and Black Lightening, which both seem to re-emphasize the stereotypes. Black Lightening, as a co-worker stated, is basically the film version "Lean on Me" with superheros and Luke Cage is well, Shaft with superheroes. I've seen both done in cinema countless times. I was disappointed by both.
The Black Panther -- surprised me. It flipped every superhero flick I'd seen upside down and shot arrows through it -- and it did it subtly without any telling, all showing, and no descents into obvious parody or satire.
From the trailers, I thought, okay this looks like a busy movie with one too many chase scenes and no character development. I couldn't have been more wrong. Oh sure, there are plenty of explosions, fight scenes and chase scenes -- very long ones in fact.
But there's a lot more going on. This is a film that surprise, surprise actually has something to say, it goes above and beyond what superhero flicks do, and comments heavily on how we view race -- and our world, taking Wonder Woman's anti-violence message and exploding it in a way that the Wonder Woman flick never quite accomplishes.
( spoilers, not major, pretty vague, but cut in case people want to go in cold )
I loved this film so much. I'd be willing to see it again. There are so many layers. So much there.
Best superhero film ever, and considering the fact that I've seen practically all of them...
A+