Ryan Coogler’s third feature “Black Panther” has now made box office history
grossing well over $360 million in its opening weekend, making it the fifth highest
opening weekend of all time.
The overwhelming feeling when watching “Black Panther” may be pride in oneself
and in ones origins, but also in the excellent execution of Coogler’s pan-African
vision.
To further celebrate what is now World Wakanda Week, we’ve listed out the 10
most remarkable features of the film.
1
The Languages
In the establishing scenes, Nakai (Lupita Nyong’o) is heard speaking perfect Hausa
after a scuppered covert mission to save the over 200 girls abducted, in Nigeria,
by Boko Haram in 2014. Elsewhere in the film, characters interlace English and
IsiXhosa (as well as other African languages) in a way that is true to how is it
spoken by many, but is rarely ever pulled off as seamlessly as is done in the film.
Many films fail at this. Many novels fail at this, but then most novelists are poor
at dialogue. Theatre lags behind these forms in its diversities of stories that are
not ostensibly “white”, and would struggle with the fine art of writing anddelivering this intricate lattice work of languages envisioned by writers Ryan
Coogler and Joe Robert Cole.
2
The Water
The myth about black people being afraid of water bodies, whether sea or ocean,
may have grown out of the Atlantic Slave Trade, but any truth in the psychology
would surely be less so for the descendants of Africans who remained on the
continent. The fight for the soul and supremacy of Wakanda is done, not just in
still bodies like seas or oceans, but on the precarious cliffs of a waterfall. Far
from the fallacy of psychological hangover, it is in fact a holy ground on which a
king is consecrated.
3
The Soundscape
In “Fruitvale Station” (2013), Coogler’s first film, very little incidental music is
used which impressed the everyday mundanity of Oscar Grant’s life – even when
the outcome is made clear in the opening shots. In “Black Panther”, the choice of
music is well-judged and effectively evokes place and feeling. The drumming is
majestic and common to the continent’s constellation of ethnic groups. American
trap is used to smoothen scene transitions. Shuri (Letitia Wright) is 16 years old
and listens to gqom when in her lab, the most vibrant of music genres among the
youth of South Africa. In “Black Panther: The Album” Kendrick Lamar has ably
marshalled over 2o African and African-American artists over 14 songs that drawfrom electronic, house and trap in a way that matches the genetic reconstitution
in Coogler’s film.
4
The Casting
Good luck finding a better caliber of actors anywhere in the world. So rich is the
seam of film and theater actors that even some small, non-speaking roles are
filled with towering talents – most noticeable is Danny Sapani as a Border Tribe
Elder. Sapani is a respected theatre actor in London who’s played the lead in
important “Black” productions that include “Moon On Rainbow Shawl” (2012), but
more arrestingly in Lorraine Hansberry’s Le Blanc (2016) in which he plays
Tshembe Motoseh, a leader of an African nation faced with civil war and colonial
oppression.
5
The Call For Restitution
The over 200 000 African arts and artefacts in the British Museum in London is a
most impressive collection of stolen and acquired goods, a fact raised in “Black
Panther” by Erik Killmonger (Michael B Jordan) when he questioned a gallerist
over the displays of Fula, Ashanti and Benin masks in what could be, given the
size of the film, the loudest call yet for restitution.
In April, the Victoria & Albert Museum in London will open an exhibition titled
“Treasure From Ethiopia”, a collection of treasures including a gold crownbelonging to Emperor Tewodros II taken after a British conquest in 1868.
Ethiopians, some under the aegis of Association For The Return of Maqdala
Ethiopian Treasures, have long called campaigned for their return. Impressively or
not, no call is made for reparations.
6
The Accents
Danai Gurira is Zimbabwean. Forest Whitaker revisits the Ugandan accent he
learnt for his Oscar winning role in “The Last King Of Scotland”. Lupita Nyongo is
(still) Kenyan. Chad Boseman settled for South African. Winston Duke went in for
Nigeria perhaps. Michael B Jordan is resolutely African-American. Daniel Kaluuya
is Ugandan and was scarily convincing in 2013 as Mobutu Sese Seko, alongside
Chiwetel Ejiofor, in Aime Cesaire’s “A Season In The Congo” (Young Vic Theatre).
7
The Gender Balance
The choice of 16 year old Shiru (Letitia Wright) as the quartermaster of Wakanada
is a brave and sensible one that confounds popular beliefs that women steer from
sciences, which in turn feeds into male chauvinism. Her brilliance would confound
the brains at Mensa but more realistically, it is reminiscent of The African Science
Academy, a girls only advance level school for maths and Science in Ghana
founded by Nigerian scientist Tom Ilube.8
The Visual Design
The film is a sumptuous visual feast of colour, design and symbolism that will
require multiple viewings to examine, therefore deepening the viewing
experience (and helps with box office returns). What amazes is the level of
research and feeling put in by Ruth Carter (costume design) and Hannah Bleacher
(production design) which has gone a long way to amplify Coogler’s pan-african
vision – some of which a very helpful twitter user has illustrated here.
9
The Spirituality & The Mythology
Leo Frobenius’ feverish dream of white supremacy that is the “African Atlantis”
was daft in the early 1900, as is every lie told to justify human subjugation in all
forms. The kingdom of Wakanda may have been based on the reclusive terrains of
Lesotho in Southern Africa, but the pan African dream of a workable
amalgamation of nation states is powerfully conveyed in the film as an aim that is
not simply possible, but achievable. Special screenings at African Union
assemblies would make for an interesting viewing experience at the very least.
10
The Director / Writer
“Fruitvale Station” reimagined the life and death of Oscar Grant at the hands of
the police, and so was a naturalist drama faithful to its source. But if we were
paying closer attention, two scenes in “Creed” (2015) indicated Coogler’sremarkable decision making, and feeling for black politics and super-heroism, in
ways that are bold and rarely seen in big studio productions. One is the intimate
bedroom scene when Adonis (Michael B Jordan) fixes the long braids of his
girlfriend Bianca (Tessa Thompson) in bed. In the second, a group of bikers escort
Adonis who jogs at full speed, tethering on the hyperreal, and one beat away
from bolting into the sky (better seen than explained). In all, Coogler is astute
beyond belief.