[Danukem]

Today I saw the Black Panther at an Imax theater. This is a pretty decent film for its genre (superhero action movie) but it is not nearly as good as you have been told it is. Visually it is a feast for the eyes. The action scenes are well-executed and mildly entertaining, although sometimes frustrating to watch due to tight shots and too many cuts. In fairness, the action scenes would have been considered astonishing back when I grew up, in the days before high quality CG and and video games. But those days are gone, and we are harder to impress. The acting is good. It's fine; they are good actors who act like they are supposed to act. But none of the performances are particularly memorable. The story is..ok. Black Panther has a very safe, by-the-numbers script without a lot of surprises. The film lacks the cast chemistry and humor that typifies other MCU films. The contrast between Black Panther and the recent Thor Ragnarok in this respect could not be greater -- Ragnarok is a successful comedy with occasional touches of drama, whereas Black Panther takes itself completely seriously from beginning to end. The film does have a message. It's a bland, politically correct but relatively inoffensive message about how it's good to help oppressed people by being nice to them and giving them good stuff. According to the film, the other two options regarding oppressed people are (1) ignoring them and (2) handing them guns and hoping for the best. By the time this message became clear, I was too bored with the narrative to muster any annoyance at the obvious straw men and assumptions supporting the film's ideological bias.

My score: 6.5 / 10

[Merlijn]

I'm going to see this movie tomorrow, really curious.

I take hype with a grain of salt nowadays, every big "event" movie gets hyped beforehand and generally they're just competent blockbusters.
And there's nothing wrong with a solid blockbuster, but no need to pretend it's more than that.
I don't expect the message to be particulary deep, since the movie needs to do all the regular superhero stuff as well.

But I loved Thor Ragnarok and generally think the MCU is doing a great job at keeping things fresh, so I'll probably enjoy this one as well.

[Danukem]

Merlijn, on 18 February 2018 - 02:26 AM, said:

But I loved Thor Ragnarok and generally think the MCU is doing a great job at keeping things fresh, so I'll probably enjoy this one as well.

I also loved Thor Ragnarok. I would give Ragnarok an 8 out of 10, maybe even 8.5

[Forge]

put that review and score from the o.p. over on rotten tomatoes and see how many death threats you get.

[Danukem]

Forge, on 18 February 2018 - 11:38 AM, said:

put that review and score from the o.p. over on rotten tomatoes and see how many death threats you get.

No thanks!

But to state the obvious: If the story were exactly the same but it was about a hidden high-tech nation somewhere near Mongolia (starring, you know, people of that regional ancestry) , then no one would give two fucks about it.

[Merlijn]

I liked the movie, I appreciated the time it took up to set up its world and characters.
In the end everything that was set up did have a satisfying pay-off, never felt like the plot or the characters got inconsistent at any point.
And I know that sounds like filmmaking 101, but apparently DC and even the new star wars have trouble implementing it.

I also liked both villains, Andy Serkis was clearly having a blast (pun intended ) and Michael B Jordan stole the scenes he was in.

A few downsides: the final battle was lackluster, and whenever black panther has his suit on he's pretty much indestructible.

[PsychoGoatee]

I thought it was okay, but on the upper end of okay, not bad. Fun movie, a bit by the numbers, blurry CG action at times etc.

Random thought, but you 90s gamers might dig it, reminded me of how good Quest for Glory 3 was! A cool African adventure right there. Actually this movie might have benefitted from some monsters or more pulpy comic book weirdness for me. But still, solid flick in the superhero formula.

[OpenMaw]

My in depth, heartfelt review.