Black Is King

As a black man, this whole film reeked of racism. The title alone is enough to turn you away and the hour and half long film appears to be a desperate attempt at some sort of award. No thanks.

Its just one giant musci video, and not the good kind. the one that just has a few shots of the characters singing, and some eyecandy in between. and the music doesnt drive a distinct narrative, so the it all feels directionless. it tries to mask itself with the lion king, but fails dreadfully. it just uses snipets of the movie in between songs, and tries to the the songs after each snippet. but the songs end up not driving the story further, thus each snippit with each song comes off as disjointed.

2/10: just listen to the music, you dont need these visuals

"Black is King" is a movie supposedly based on the morals and story of the 2019 Lion King, connected by Beyonce's music; a visual album. The main theme was that...Black is King (no pun intended).

Let me make this clear: I am not a person of color, and I cannot claim to relate to any of the feelings that the primary audience may have toward this movie. I personally do not believe Beyonce knew that what she was saying and doing could be interpreted as pretentious, preachy, and possibly racist(?). At first, I thought maybe I am just not the main demographic, but after reading a few of the reviews that noted that they were of African culture to any degree, I realized this movie has people completely split. I will not speak on how this movie represents a culture I do not know too much about, simply on how it made me feel.

I will start with positives. The dancing clearly has effort in it and the choreography, and some of the costumes (while mostly flashy) are at least different enough to see the lengths they went to create some sort of identity. There were some nice natural locations in deserts and jungles and rivers, which were colorful. There is also some slight touches of style that were enjoyable in camera angles, feeling like a national geographic movie.

Now the negatives. This whole film is inconsistent in nearly every regard. The editing is well-paced in some scenes, and awful in others (during some dance scenes, it looked like some high budget Tik Tok video fad). The costumes are pretty, but there are so many that it just feels like Beyonce is showing off how rich she is, and the same goes for locations, feeling like she is showing off her house. Self-indulgent really is a fitting word. The changing aspect ratios have no symbolic effect as the smaller aspect ratio is not limited to a single dance number and song. The symbolism is not always spot on, like the part where the boy is a comet, or the baby being sent down the river. The lyrics do not usually match visuals at all like the "jealousy" song. The connections to the Lion King are tenuous at best (and this is a nitpick, but why didn't they use the original Lion King? Most people agree, 2019 Lion King was not great). The poetry, from someone who is usually good at interpreting poetry, does not always connect. It is not enough to use metaphors to describe an entire group of people, you have to do something with those metaphors. Also, some of the dance moves do not seem like they should be shown to families who show young kids this, two of the scenes in particular having very sexual moves, flashing twerking very close to the camera in skin tight clothing. Some movies could pull this off because they handled their messaging more maturely, but I cannot say the same here.

This movie feels like epitome of trying to inspire people by primping out your richness and wealth under the guise of metaphors and humbleness to make only one group of people feel important. A good movie is supposed to make that group feel important, but not alienate the rest of your audience. A white person can watch "Black Panther" or "Queen of Katwe" and not feel weird for being white, a boy can watch "Wonder Woman" or "Little Women" and feel empowered just as much as a girl, and a non-Asian can watch "Crazy Rich Asians" and relate to the differences in cultures because they don't draw too much attention to the fact that they are "Black" or a "Woman", or an "Asian" any more than necessary. "Black is King" does not understand this. "Black is King" made me, at the very least, slightly uncomfortable and a little guilty for being white. I've never had that experience before and I do not want to seem like the victim here. I have stated my case well enough for you to determine if you want to see this yourself or not.

85 minutes of the most visually arresting, mind-blowingly opulent and strikingly powerful visuals ever put to film. It's truly that good.

WARNING: lengthy post

I felt so many emotions watching this, I took notes. I thought the negative comments were from non-black conservative trolls until I decided to watch it for myself. I was excited. At first. Then I felt embarrassed. It was as if Beyonce became indignant because The Lion King received mixed reviews that she decided to take matters into her own hands, only to deliver another "Carmen" or "Obsessed" aka an effort that no one really wants to see again. Ever. When it comes to movie-making SPECIFICALLY, this one makes no sense. Some of the music videos do not correlate with the spoken word. It loosely follows The Lion King and branches off into a poetry-laced jungle haunted with mysticism. The rosy words are overly self-indulgent to the point it made me feel like melted ice cream. There were many lines about how black skin is made from the stars and how our fluffy hair is strands of wisdom, blah blah blah. It was alot of beautiful gibberish that is meant to uplift insecure women of color. In the process, the movie neglects many things. For one thing, what about light skinned women? The song "brown-skinned Girls" excludes women who are biracial (black+white) or multiracial/black like Beyonce, who prides herself in not only being black but Creole. When it comes to the "BLACK" part of Black is King...are we only talking about brown skinned to deep-brown-skinned africans and african americans?

The other thing is, this film does not represent Blackness well at all. In many scenes, there's a lot of stunting going on, flashing riches, sass and beauty.

That's not blackness. Even more heart-breaking, the part that REALLY mattered, the part about taking care of your family and working hard, is mentioned briefly by some unknown speaker. Once that's over, it's back to rolling hips and dramatic outfits... Which brings me to my next point...

Beyonce's power is her beauty. She should model often because she is incredibly beautiful, however have you noticed the only reason why people love the film is because it is aesthetically beautiful? That's about it. When it comes to choreography or story-telling etc, Black is King lacks majorly. It kind of became a fest of rolling hips and sultry gazes and synchronized flowy movements but that's nothing original nor inspiring. To be fair, it was an honest effort and better than anything I could ever do. And what was up with the whole River Baby/Moses situation?

The dangerous parts about this movie are the spiritual or religious and supremacist beliefs that seem to be promoted throughout. Speakers whisper words such as "I am the creator of all things" and exalt blackness to a royal and even celestial level. "I know I am a god," "Blackness should be equated with glory." Why though? Black is beautiful indeed, but no amount of "research" could ever make me feel above others (white servant included--seen in the music segment "Mood.") or that I am a god myself--complete with a "mother Mary" like painting of myself (major side-eye...). That is dangerous ideology. Royalty is not determined by skin color, Divinity is beyond humanity, and racism does not always or usually stem from jealousy or intimidation. This just screams "REVENGE!!!" I am not empowered by this movie, I feel like apologizing for this movie. I will give another warning, though, and that is to beware: Jesus isn't white, but black isn't god either....

Now I'm closing. Watch this movie and be wowed by the outfits and beauty. That should be celebrated. But when it comes to great story telling, black excellence, black royalty, black heroism, black love, overcoming tribalism, racism,war...

Just watch Black Panther, bruh...