Photo: Marvel Studios
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Angela Bassett in 'Black Panther: Wakanda Forever'
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
(In Theaters Nov. 11)
Following the success of 2018’s Black Panther, director Ryan Coogler happily agreed to make a sequel. He’d finished an initial treatment of the screenplay when actor Chadwick Boseman, 43, who played the role of Black Panther/T’Challa, died unexpectedly of complications from colon cancer.
Coogler considered scrapping the project, before concluding that much of what he’d written featured other characters from the fictional African nation, Wakanda. He retooled his script with expanded roles for T’Challa’s mother, Queen of the Wakanda, Ramonda, portrayed by Angela Bassett. Also featured are Letitia Wright, returning as Shuri, T’Challa’s sister. Shuri invents technology and devices that propel the Wakanda Kingdom ahead of others.
In this chapter, the Wakanda are drawn into conflict with world powers seeking to steal their inventions and lands. The Wakandas band together with the help of War Dog Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o), and CIA Agent Everett Ross (Martin Freeman), in an effort to protect themselves. Another powerful nation, the underwater kingdom of Talocan, is introduced. It's led by the mercurial Namor (Tenoch Huerta), whose potential to become either friend or foe presents a constant challenge. The film clocks in at 160 minutes,and is beautiful to behold. Indications are that Walt Disney’s latest, PG-13, Marvel Comics film, will make major bank. (Lisa Miller)
The Friendship Game
(Limited Theatrical Release & Streaming on AppleTV & VUDU, Nov. 11)
The Friendship Game’s trailer reveals four close friends discovering an object made to test the bonds of their loyalty. This object, resembling the floating orb from 1996’s The Arrival, has morphed into something equally ominous. To activate its power, the teens simultaneously place their fingers on its surface, and one-by-one, reveal their deepest desire. Any sane person will wonder why they agree to do this? After performing the ritual, one friend goes missing, and the other three begin to experience terrible things that may or may not be hallucinations. A state of frenzied paranoia sets in, leading to chaos. Led by Peyton List, the cast includes Brendan Meyer, Kelcey Mawema, and Kaitlyn Santa Juana. The film is directed by Scooter Corkle from a script by Damien Ober. (Lisa Miller)
No Escape
(MVD Blu-ray)
2022 seemed a long way off in 1994 when No Escape, set in 2022, was released. In some respects, the movie’s vision of the future appears wrong from the perspective of now: the computers look clickety-clack and slow and that futuristic light rail never arrived. And yet, other things have come true. We’re not far away from the for-profit prison system, run by a transnational corporation, where antihero John Robbins (Ray Liotta) is sentenced. Robbins is an ex-Marine doing life for a 2011 incident in Benghazi, one year shy of the real storming of the U.S. consulate. DNA tests reveal Robbins’ “pathological aversion to authority”—a genetic evaluation that doesn’t seem too distant. Within the first half hour, No Escape turns into a sequence of chases and fights, perfect material for the Nintendo game it inspired. (David Luhrssen)
Symphony for a Massacre
(Cohen Film Collection Blu-ray)
The camera follows the much younger wife of a nightclub owner as she leaves his establishment, drives across town and knocks on the door of her lover, Christian. She wants to leave her husband, but Christian says not yet. Revealingly, his first concern is a business deal with the older gentleman. The business turns out to be crooked. And he turns out to be a crook without honor.
Jacques Deray’s 1963 crime drama has been fully restored for its Blu-ray release in all its lustrous black and white splendor. Cameras pan and track, tension builds and suspense is maintained. Symphony for a Massacre also includes one of the greatest crime-in-the-confines-of-a-moving-train sequences ever filmed. (David Luhrssen)
