Movie Reviews
THE WOMAN KING
Dominant Worldview and Different Worldview Content material/Components:
Very robust Romantic, politically appropriate worldview with very robust politically appropriate, false, leftist revisionist historical past concerning the closing battles between the Kingdom of Dahomey and the Oyo Empire in 1823 and with robust false polytheistic faith containing some obvious occult ancestor worship, plus some ethical components supporting freedom and opposing slavery and the mixed-race son of a feminine slave wears a crucifix round his neck and is depicted as an excellent man and one character appears to be a gay, an effeminate man or an effeminate eunuch, however the film typically avoids any overt lesbian relationships between a bunch of feminine warriors who aren’t allowed to marry and have kids
Foul Language:
One “h” obscenity, and no obvious profanities
Violence:
Very robust bloody warfare violence with troopers wielding machetes, spears, rifles, and some pistols and one facet makes use of gunpowder to rig ant hills with explosions
Nudity:
Higher male nudity
Alcohol Use:
Some alcohol use
Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:
No smoking or medicine; and,
Miscellaneous Immorality:
Kidnapping, slavery, injustice, oppression however principally rebuked.
THE WOMAN KING is a fictionalized historic epic concerning the feminine warriors that King Ghezo of the coastal West African Kingdom of Dahomey used to defeat the African Kingdom of Oyo in 1823, which was supported by Portuguese slave merchants. Full of bloody, although not gory, warfare violence, THE WOMAN KING has some spectacular manufacturing values and stable performances, however the film whitewashes the depiction of Dahomey and King Ghezo, who truly was very concerned within the worldwide slave commerce, engaged in ceremonial human sacrifices and used his feminine warriors to enter the inside to hunt for captives to be bought as slaves.
The film opens by telling viewers that members of the Oyo Empire close to the West Coast of Africa are beginning to invade the Kingdom of Dahomey dominated by a King Ghezo in 1823. A word on the display additionally informs viewers that Dahomey has a fearsome group of feminine warriors referred to as the Agojie.
Minimize to some feminine warriors, led by “Normal” Nanisca, attacking a village of the Mali folks, who’ve joined with the Oyo military. The soldiers are attempting to free some Oyo captives being held by the village. They reach killing all of the male troopers and setting the captives free.
Again within the capital metropolis, the captives are given the selection to hitch the feminine warriors. Some do and a few don’t. They have to reside in a separate compound, nevertheless, connected to the palace of the King Ghezo, who has many wives. The film doesn’t point out this truth, however the King of Dahomey generally would take a number of the warriors for his wives.
In the meantime, in one other a part of the town, a 19-year-old younger girl named Nawi refuses her father’s command to marry an older man, who clearly likes to abuse his wives. As was the customized, Nawi’s father decides to present his “uncontrollable” daughter to the King. Within the warrior compound, Nawi decides she’d prefer to be one of many feminine warriors.
Nawi turns into mates with the opposite feminine troopers, together with one of many older skilled leaders, who turns into Nawi’s mentor. Nonetheless, Nawi has issues at all times obeying orders, so Normal Nanisca retains her eyes on Nawi.
Dahomey takes half within the worldwide slave commerce, principally by a close-by port’s connection to Portugal’s slave commerce to Brazil and different components of the New World. Additionally, due to previous conflicts that didn’t end up so properly, Dahomey should pay tribute to the Oyo Empire. King Ghezo decides he’s had sufficient of this example. Additionally, Normal Nanisca tries to persuade King Ghezo that they need to cease collaborating within the slave commerce anyway and harvest palm oil to promote to Portugal as an alternative.
Finally, due to King Ghezo’s breaking of the “treaty” with the Oyo Empire, the native Oyo chieftain sends a military to invade the Dahomey capital. Nonetheless, Normal Nanisco has some surprises deliberate for them.
In the meantime, Nawi has change into mates with the mixed-race son of a feminine slave who’s include the Portuguese slave merchants to see his mom’s homeland. Nawi additionally has a secret previous that connects her to Normal Nanisco, who’s performed by Oscar-winning actress Viola Davis.
THE WOMAN KING has some correct historic depictions of Dahomey and its feminine warriors. Additionally, its common depiction of Dahomey’s battle with the Oyo Empire, which was in decline on the time of the story, is traditionally appropriate. Nonetheless, the film whitewashes the folks of Dahomey, particularly King Ghezo, who had been closely concerned within the worldwide slave commerce. Dahomey’s participation in that slave commerce principally concerned the slave commerce that Portugal instituted between Dahomey and its colony in Brazil (traditionally, Brazil imported many extra African slaves than the West Indies and America did; it additionally was the final nation within the West to abolish slavery, in 1888).
Many articles on the Web element proof of King Ghezo’s promotion and participation within the worldwide slave commerce. Among the many most hanging, informative articles, nevertheless, are these two articles: https://neusroom.com/king-gezo-of-dahomey-west-africas-most-notorious-slave-trading-monarch-who-had-an-all-female-army/ and https://appsaf.apieproject.com/information/2022/08/05/the-kingdom-of-dahomey-seat-of-the-slave-trade/. The primary article even particulars how Ghezo and his son and successor engaged in ceremonial sacrifices of lots of of slaves and warfare captives. Human sacrifice was a typical observe in Dahomey earlier than Britain put an finish to the slave commerce within the 1850s. In fact, human sacrifice was additionally a widespread observe in lots of African tribes traditionally, from Uganda to Zambia and Nigeria. Additionally, earlier than the Europeans even arrived en masse in Africa, African tribes had been partaking in slavery, together with making warfare captives slaves. As well as, Muslims had been closely concerned within the slave commerce, starting in Northern and Jap Africa within the Eighth and Ninth Centuries. African Muslims began controlling the Oyo Empire by the 1820s.
Regardless of all this particular historical past, the title character in THE WOMAN KING finally ends up blaming the Europeans and even “the People” for maintaining the slave commerce going. Additionally, by the top of the film, she seems to be convincing King Ghezo to desert the slave commerce and change to exporting palm oil. The large change from slave buying and selling to exporting palm oil in Dahomey didn’t actually occur till after Britain ended the slave commerce within the early 1850s, nevertheless.
It must also be famous that, in response to legend, the formation of the feminine warriors in Dahomey didn’t occur till about 1708 when a lady named Hangbe grew to become Queen after the demise of her twin brother. She was declared Queen and ruler as a result of she allegedly led some battles after his sudden demise and since two of her different brothers had been deemed too younger to ascend the throne. A succession for one of many two different brothers was deliberate, however Queen Hangbe allegedly backed the dropping candidate, so the winner unceremoniously deposed her. Descendants of Dahomey’s feminine warriors nonetheless venerate Queen Hangbe. Be that as it could, not like the film, it’s extraordinarily unlikely, given this legend, that King Ghezo would ever have named his major consort the “Lady King.” MOVIEGUIDE® couldn’t discover any historic information of both factor, regardless of combing by quite a few articles, together with a number of encyclopedia references.
Throughout the film, the characters join the film’s creation of a King and Queen to a creation delusion that the folks of Dahomey believed on the time. The faith, which was referred to as Vodun and is the precursor of the voodoo faith practiced in locations like Haiti and Louisiana, tells of a god and goddess named Lisa and Mawu, who had been put in command of Creation by a supreme being, a feminine god named Nana Buluku who “retired.” The youngsters of the supreme being are generally mixed into an androgynous male-female god named Mawu-Lisa. Nonetheless, though this cultural historical past lends some potential credence to the film’s depiction of a female and male ruler for Dahomey, traditionally the Kingdom of Dahomey was a male-dominated society the place Kings, not Queens, are given the supreme energy. It’s stated, although, that Queen Hangbe’s youthful brother, who ended her reign, eradicated all references to her rule from the Kingdom’s official information.
In the end, THE WOMAN KING has a particularly robust Romantic, politically appropriate worldview with numerous false, leftist revisionist historical past. It completely absolves Africans of their guilt for collaborating within the worldwide slave commerce. Not solely that, but it surely additionally doesn’t even point out the participation and unfold of the slave commerce by transformed Muslims in Africa. The film additionally has loads of false faith and occult references to polytheism and occult ancestor worship, together with mystical venerations of heroines who died combating for his or her nation/kingdom.
Lastly, the revisionist historical past in THE WOMAN KING accommodates numerous bloody warfare violence that may repel or disturb some or many moviegoers, specifically extra delicate ones. Although there are not any ugly visible decapitations or slicing off of limbs, the film does indicate they happen. Additionally, the feminine warriors are proven chopping off the heads of dummies manufactured from straw or rope throughout a number of coaching scenes.
Backside Line: THE WOMAN KING is a narrative primarily based on leftist lies about Africa and Europe, with a quick however evil, gratuitous slander in opposition to “People.” It’s definitely true that most individuals in Europe, America, the West Indies, and South America, together with folks dwelling within the non-slave states of america, ought to have rose up in opposition to the evils of slavery lengthy earlier than the U.S. Structure and the Republican Celebration put an finish to the slave commerce and slavery in America and earlier than Britain stopped the worldwide slave commerce within the early 1850s. Nonetheless, the identical may be stated for black folks in Africa, together with African Muslims. What’s even worse about THE WOMAN KING is that it doesn’t even point out the observe of human sacrifice that apparently was an enormous a part of the Kingdom of Dahomey’s tradition earlier than Europeans put an finish to such depraved practices within the mid to late 1800s. Leftist filmmakers and activists need white folks in America and Nice Britain to confront the evils of their previous, however when are they going to start out demanding African-People in america and black folks of African descent in Britain do the identical?
It’s one factor to rearrange some historic particulars to make a narrative circulate higher, in a extra thrilling method. Nonetheless, it’s fairly one other to falsify historic details or create false straw man arguments to suit a controversial sociopolitical agenda or to whitewash a bunch or “race” of individuals so you possibly can demonize one other group or “race” of individuals. In that gentle, descendants of the folks of the Oyo Empire in Africa may need a particular grievance or two in opposition to THE WOMAN KING because the film depicts their ancestors to be in cahoots with the European slave merchants whereas it absolves King Ghezo and Dahomey.
Making art in the middle of the apocalypse is the literal and figurative ethos of “Grand Theft Hamlet,” one of the cleverest “What can we do during lockdown?” pandemic picture projects.
A couple of British actors — Sam Crane and Mark Ooosterveen –– stared into the same gutting void of everybody who was unable to work during the pandemic lockdowns. As they killed some time meeting in the online gamescape of “Grand Theft Auto,” they stumbled into the Vinewood (Hollywood) Bowl setting of that Greater L.A. killing zone. And like actors since the beginning of time, thought they’d put on a play.
As they wander and ponder this brilliant conceit, they wrestle with whether to attempt casting, setting and directing this play amidst a sea of first-person shooters/stabbers/run-you-over-with-their car. They face fascinating theatrical problem solving. How DO you make art and recruit an online in-the-game audience for Shakespeare in a world of self-absorbed, bloody-minded avatars, some of whom stumble upon their efforts and ignore their “Please don’t shoot me” pleas?
Crane and Oosterveen, both white 40somethings Brits, grapple with “what people are like in here,” as in “people are violent in the game.” VERY violent. But “people are violent in Shakespeare.” Pretty much “everybody dies in ‘Hamlet,’” after all.
Putting on a play in the middle of a real apocalypse set in a CGI generated apocalypse is “a terrible idea,” Oosterveen confesses (in avatar form). “But I definitely want to try to do it.”
Crane, struggling with the same mental health issues tens of millions faced during lockdown, enlists his documentary filmmaker wife Pinny Grylls to enter the game and film all this.
And as their endeavors progress, through trial and many many deaths (“WASTED,” the game’s graphics remind you), everybody interested in their idea trots out favorite couplets from Shakespeare as “auditions.” They round up “actors” from all over (mostly Brits, though), they remind us of the power of Shakespeare’s words.
“To be, or not to be, that is the question. Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep…”
Dodging would-be gamer/killers and recruiting others, they will see how a marriage can be strained by work or video game addiction and fret over the futility of it all.
The film, co-scripted and directed by Crane and Grylls, with Crane playing Hamlet, and narrated and somewhat driven by Oosterveen, who portrays Polonius, is a mad idea but a great gimmick, one that occasionally transcends that gimmick.
We’re reminded of the visual sophistication of CGI landscapes — they try out a lot of settings, and use more than one, a scene staged on top of a blimp, seaside for a soliloquy. The limitations of jerky-movement video game characters, lips-moving but not syncing up to dialogue, are just as obvious.
And if all the gamescape’s “a stage, and all the men and women merely players,” some folks — MANY folks — need to buy better headset microphones. The distorted audio and staticky dynamic range of such gear spoils a lot of the dialogue.
In a production where the words matter as much as this, as “acting” in avatar form is a catalog of limitless limitations, one becomes ever more grateful that the film is a documentary of the “making” of a “Grand Theft Auto” “Hamlet,” and not merely the play. Because inventive settings and occasional murderous “distractions” aside, that leaves a lot to be desired.
Rating: R, video game violence, profanity
Cast: The voices/avatars of Sam Crane,
Mark Oosterveen, Pinny Grylls, Jen Cohn, Tilly Steele, Lizzie Wofford, Dilo Opa, Sam Forster, Jeremiah O’Connor and Gareth Turkington
Credits: Scripted and directed by Sam Crane and Pinny Grylls, based on “Hamlet” by William Shakespeare. A Mubi release.
Running time: 1:29
Movie Reviews
A Real Pain review – Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin take a Holocaust tour of Poland
This isn’t the easiest moment in history to be launching a film exploring its author’s Jewish heritage, thanks to the violent repercussions of events in the Middle East, but the historical baggage that comes with that heritage is all part of Eisenberg’s theme. Set to an eloquent and frequently melancholy soundtrack of Chopin’s piano music, A Real Pain is a bittersweet story about two Jewish cousins, Benji and David Kaplan (Kieran Culkin and Eisenberg), who take a trip to Poland in memory of their beloved grandmother, a recently-deceased Holocaust survivor. Beneath the wisecracks and one-liners there’s a subtle and penetrating analysis of family bonds and the burden of shared history.
The film’s gentle ripple of underlying sadness stems from the fact that the cousins were previously very close, but have drifted apart. They’re about as dissimilar as it’s possible to be, but glimpses of their odd-couple bond gradually resurface as the narrative develops. Eisenberg’s David is quiet and introverted, but is successful as both family man and in his Manhattan-based career in computing. On the other hand, we gradually learn that Benji is drifting rootlessly through his life out in the suburbs. He’s searching desperately for something meaningful, and is struggling to keep himself on the rails. He has been hit hard by his grandmother’s death, confessing that “she was just my favourite person in the world.”
In any event, the role gives Culkin carte blanche to charge recklessly through the gears, in a bravura performance which gives the film its centrifugal force. Some of the time he’s a babbling extrovert who effortlessly dominates any social gathering, for instance persuading everybody in their touring party to pose for selfies on a statue commemorating the Warsaw Uprising, but the flipside is that he can’t tell where the boundaries are (and has little interest in finding them). David is aghast when they’re heading for the boarding gate for their flight to Poland, and Benji cheerfully announces that he’s carrying a stash of dope (“I got some good shit for when we land”.)
One moment everybody loves Benji, then suddenly he becomes an insufferable asshole. He’s prone to wildly inappropriate outbursts, like the moment when the tour party are travelling in a first class railway carriage and Benji goes into an emotionally incontinent display of guilt about the contrast with his Jewish antecedents being transported to death camps in cattle trucks.
Fortunately their travelling companions (who include Dirty Dancing veteran Jennifer Grey, pictured top, and Kurt Egyiawan as a survivor of the Rwandan genocide) show superhuman patience, not least their English tour guide James (Will Sharpe), who graciously accepts Benji’s tactless critique of his guiding technique (Sharpe and Eisenberg pictured above). The fact that James is a scholar of East European Studies from Oxford University, not Jewish himself but “fascinated by the Jewish experience”, is a crafty little comic narrative all of its own.
It’s a difficult film to categorise, being part comedy, part road movie, part psychotherapy session and part personal memoir. Perhaps Woody Allen might have called it a “situation tragedy”. It’s a clever, complex piece, but Eisenberg has made it look breezily simple.
On the index of possible spoil alert sins one could make about the erotic thriller Babygirl, perhaps the least objectionable is that which most people already know: The film belongs to the very rare species of film literally ending with the big “O.” Nicole Kidman’s final orgasmic aria of ecstasy caps off a film which dares to tell a morally slippery tale. But for all the high points and gray zones of writer-director Halina Reijn’s intriguing film, the least ambiguous moment arrives at its climax. So to speak.
The central premise is a maze-like anatomy of an affair, between Kidman’s Romy Mathis, a fierce but also mid-life conflicted 50-year-old CEO of a robotics company, and a sly, handsome twenty-something intern Samuel (Harris Dickinson, who will appear at the Virtuosos Tribute at this year’s Santa Barbara International Film Festival). Sparks fly, and mutually pursued seduction ensues behind closed doors and away from the prying eyes of her family (and husband, played by Antonio Banderas).
From the outset, though, it’s apparent that nefarious sexual exploits, though those do liberally spice up the film’s real estate, are not the primary subject. It’s more a film steeped with power-play gamesmanship, emotional extortion, and assorted manipulations of class and hierarchical structures. Samuel teases a thinly veiled challenge to her early on, “I think you like to be told what to do.” She feigns shock, but soon acquiesces, and what transpires on their trail of deceptions and shifting romantic-sexual relationship includes a twist in which he demands her submission in exchange for him not sabotaging her career trajectory.
Kidman, who gives another powerful performance in Babygirl, is no stranger to roles involving frank sexuality and complications thereof. She has excelled in such fragile and vulnerable situations, especially boldly in Gus Van Sant’s brilliant To Die For (also a May/October brand dalliance story), and Stanley Kubrick’s carnally acknowledged Eyes Wide Shut. Ironically or not, she finds herself in the most tensely abusive sex play as the wife of Alexander Skarsgård in TVs Big Little Lies.
Compared to those examples, Babygirl works a disarmingly easygoing line. For all of his presumed sadistic power playing, Dickinson — who turns in a nuanced performance in an inherently complex role — is often confused and sometimes be mused in the course of his actions or schemes. In an early tryst encounter, his domination play seems improvised and peppered with self-effacing giggles, while in a later, potentially creepier hotel scene, his will to wield power morphs into his state of vulnerable, almost child-like reliance on her good graces. The oscillating power play dynamics get further complicated.
Complications and genre schematics also play into the film’s very identity, in fresh ways. Dutch director (and actress) Reijn has dealt with erotically edgy material in the past, especially with her 2019 film Instinct. But, despite its echoes and shades of Fifty Shades of Gray and 9½ Weeks, Babygirl cleverly tweaks the standard “erotic thriller” format — with its dangerous passions and calculated upward arc of body heating — into unexpected places. At times, the thriller form itself softens around the edges, and we become more aware of the gender/workplace power structures at the heart of the film’s message.
But, message-wise, Reijn is not ham-fisted or didactic in her treatment of the subject. There is always room for caressing and redirecting the impulse, in the bedroom, boardroom, and cinematic storyboarding.
See trailer here.
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