The Woman King

⭐ 7.5/10

(Originally written by Joseph)

This is a historical-action movie that follows a group of women warriors who help liberate their kingdom in Western Africa from an oppressive, evil empire. White Europeans also factor in this as bad guys, and they have to overcome them as well.

I have conflicting thoughts about this one. It is similar to movies I like such as Gladiator and Braveheart (okay I don't actually like Braveheart) and Viola Davis is without a doubt the highlight. She is phenomenal and makes as good an action hero as Crowe or Mel Gibson. How much did she work out for this role?? She looks like a Greek god.

Anyways, the action sequences are solid (about as violent as Lord of the Rings, which is a nice middle-ground). There is some nice character drama, a few nice twists. The setting is really amazing (I really love non-western period stuff), the costumes are great, the African tribal music adds a lot, and then the accents all just make this an authentic-feeling African epic.

So what's the problem? Well, first I'll say I was never super invested in the story. But in addition to that, I'll say there were moments that took away from the authenticity. The main problem is that as the movie goes on, all the characters start to feel very modern and very western and sometimes it started to make me roll my eyes. It's a story about black women warriors during the Atlantic slave trade, so obviously you expect some modern messaging. It just got to be a bit much and I was starting to suspect maybe this wasn't as historical as I thought.

Turns out, I was right, and that kinda changed how I felt about it. It's not that it was stretching facts, but inverting them. These were probably the bad guys in history by any standard, and glorifying them just seems weird.

I dunno. Without all that, this movie is pretty good. I still liked it. Just left a bad taste I suppose.