The Woman King

The Woman King (2022) is a movie my wife and I caught in theatres last night. The storyline follows an African kingdom with a new(er) king in 1823 who posses the only female army in Africa. The leader of the female Army has a past that haunts her but the respect of her king, enough to be on his council. She strongly urges him to avoid the slave trade and find alternative methods of riches. Meanwhile, those who do believe strongly in the slave trade look to march on the kingdom and bring them down. A new recruitment class to the female army brings brashness, new ideas to defend the kingdom, and the female leader's ghosts back to the forefront...

This movie is directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love & Basketball) and stars Viola Davis (The Help), Thuso Mbedu (The Underground Railroad), Lashana Lynch (No Time to Die), Sheila Atim (Doctor Strange: In the Mouth of Madness), John Boyega (Star Wars: Episode VII-IV) and Jimmy Odukoya (Mamba's Diamond).

This movie has so much depth and contains a great primary plot and even better sub plots. The writing is remarkable, thorough and very impressive. The character's inner demons are well portrayed as is their struggle to overcome them. The acting is out of this world across the board. You feel for every character; and if anything happens to anyone, you feel personally hurt. The villains were also excellent as is the outcome of each of them. The settings and cinematography is outstanding and there is impressive use of lighting. The action scenes are remarkable and the fight choreography is award winning caliber. My only complaint is an awkward love story that is obviously in here to show maturity and self discovery but I could have done without it.

Overall, this movie has literally everything you'd want in a movie - tremendous action, great villains, self discovery and character triumph. I would strongly, strongly recommend seeing this movie and score it a 10/10. We loved it.

The movie should be story of real life events as per description. However nothing that's presented here is real. Not only that but the kingdom of Dahomey's were actually a slave traders and they sold others to slavery. If nothing else this movie is idolizing slave traders.

The movie should be story of real life events as per description. However nothing that's presented here is real. Not only that but the kingdom of Dahomey's were actually a slave traders and they sold others to slavery. If nothing else this movie is idolizing slave traders.

The movie should be story of real life events as per description. However nothing that's presented here is real. Not only that but the kingdom of Dahomey's were actually a slave traders and they sold others to slavery. If nothing else this movie is idolizing slave traders.

A female empowerment movie based on a real life tribe that conquered other tribes adn then enslaved the defeated and sold them to the Atlantic slave trade.

This movie attempts to water down or re-write history, as the Nanisca were fictional. While palm oil was looked at, it wasn't as lucrative as slave trading, so it never changed.

And the title is just stupid.

But, I do have to say the sets/costumes and background were well shot and looked authentic. The acting was decent as well, but the re-writing of history is a peeve of mine, so I can't in good conscience rate this movie very highly. Movie could benefit from editing and a shorter run time.

I didn't enjoy it and if I hadn't seen it for free, I'd not have seen it at all.

It's odd with all it's patronising preaching that Hollywood are happy to glorify a character and story as long as the character is diverse.

The fact the Dahomey Tribe are the tribe that not only killed their brothers and sisters from neighbouring tribes for dominance ( normally broadcast as a white pursuit ) but also caged their people and sold them to the white slave traders, a fact omitted by " open-minded " kollywood.

Viola's character only became a leader as most of the men had been killed or sold by other communities to the slave trading fleet.

Viola Davis is a superbly diverse actress in terms or her movies and so varied characters. The fact she took this job with the tribe in questions' horrific humanitarian slaughter as well as selling tribesmen and women for goods, cigarettes and alcohol really shocks me. Only in this twisted world would humans who capture, cage and sell their kin be proclaimed as heroic figures and those who buy said humans be monsters.

I only watched 30 mins of this movie and have boycotted the rest in solidarity with victims and survivors of slavery past, present and sadly future.

( The stars are in respect of Viola Davi's and John Boyega )

I saw the two glowing reviews here and decided to write mine. I watched the movie today at the cinema and I was left with a slight feeling of disappointment.

First off, the story is engaging and the the plot progression isn't bad. But something just felt missing.

The trailer is a bit misleading but I won't spoil anything here.

Let me start with the bad; the title gives the impression that Viola Davis is the central character but this is not so from what I saw, not really.

Thuso Mbedu's character seems to be the protagonist here and her delivery is nothing short of amazing.

Lashana Lynch is equally phenomenal as a supporting character, even outshining Davis.

As for John Boyega, his outing as the young king is one or the best things about this film. I didn't know the actor had such charisma.

Generally, the acting is good, especially from the aforementioned actors.

Nigerian born actor Jimmy Odukoya is a great villain who wasn't given enough screentime.

I believe the character would have been phenomenal if his backstory had been explored.

The cinematography is below par (I have seen Nollywood movies with better camera work) but perhaps the biggest letdown is the action.

The fight sequences came off as really disappointing as it was easy to see that it wasn't real combat despite the impressive choreography.

The romance was forced and written in such a way that at the end of it all, I asked myself why it was there in the first place.

The musical score is sublime and the songs and chants got my attention.

At the risk of being bashed, I will end my review by saying The Woman King is a good movie that should have and could have been far more.