The Woman King review: The ‘real-life Black Panther’ brings the fire

The Woman King isn’t the simple tale of good and evil it appears to be. This film features the Agojie (a powerful all-female force from West Africa’s historical kingdom of Dahomey) as the protagonist. Black Panther’s Dora Milaje), against the moral rot of chattel slavery. The Dahomey aren’t pure victims, though. They also participate in the slave trade — not as extensively as the neighboring Oyo Empire, which has been terrorizing Dahomey settlements and selling their people to Portuguese slavers for decades. However, the Dahomey can capture and slave their enemies. The practice is opposed by some within the kingdom for moral reasons. Others are simply looking to get rich and don’t care how they do it.

This is ambiguity. The woman is the King less of a nationalist exercise than S.S. Rajamouli’s RRR, Mel Gibson’s Braveheart, These and many more films make real historical events simple and straightforward. This is not a Hollywood history film, but it does have all of the thrilling action and inspiring uplift that the title implies. But director Gina Prince-Bythewood (The Old Guard, Beyond the LightsHowever, screenwriter Dana Stevens and actor Corey Johnson do add to the complexity of the situation.

Viola Davis plays Nanisca the Agojie leader. She carries all the burden of the kingdom and some very nasty scars on her shoulders. The film begins with the Agojie considering ways to retaliate against the Oyo. And they’ve recently suffered losses in raids against the Oyo designed to free Dahomey captives headed to a port auction block. As a result, they’re looking for new recruits.

Photo: Sony Pictures

It’s good news for Nawi, a teenage rebel from the capital. When Nawi’s father drops her off at the palace gates, telling the guard that he’s offering his daughter as a gift to the king, he thinks he’s punishing her for refusing to accept an arranged marriage to a rich man who introduces himself by hitting her. She is saved by her father, it turns out. Nawi’s fiery nature and stubborn determination make her a much better fit for the Agojie than for sexual servitude and a life of forced farm labor.

The first half of the film focuses on Nawi’s initiation into the Agojie, following her and her fellow recruits through the boot camp-like training designed to transform them from undisciplined girls into polished warriors. The instruction only partially works on Nawi, who remains defiant even when it isn’t in her best interests. Her superiors, including Nanisca’s second-in-command, Amenza (Sheila Atim, recently seen as a doomed warrior in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness), and their fierce lieutenant, Izogie (Lashana Lynch, the Captain Marvel movies’ Maria Rambeau), discipline her when they need to. The new recruit is a joy to them both.

Because rebellion can’t be tolerated in the well-organized Agojie, but spirit and passion are encouraged and respected. Many rules govern the army. One of them is a royal directive that states no citizen may look Agojies in the eyes. They are just as concerned about protocol and custom as they are with sisterhood. Even Nanisca, despite her grave expression and tired eyes, is more gentle than Nawi thinks.

John Boyega co-stars as Dahomey sovereign King Ghezo, and the film does dive briefly into politics and castle intrigue as Nanisca and the king’s favorite wife compete for influence over Ghezo. This rivalry is less compelling than the camaraderie between the Agojie, which grows richer as the characters’ traumatic backstories and epic destinies are revealed. Women thrive and blossom in the all-female, cloistered world of the palace. And Prince-Bythewood infuses these relationships with a warmth that’s even more inspiring than scenes of powerful Black women charging into battle.

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A slow romance between Nawi (Jordan Bolger), and a half Dahomey, half Portuguese explorer named Malik feels quaint. This is one movie where romance takes a back seat to comradeship — as refreshing a change of pace as giving African history and heroism the epic action-movie treatment.

Prince-Bythewood films the set-pieces with an eye for kinetic action, with fight choreography that’s split equally between MMA-style grappling and the swinging of heavy, curved machetes. The sound design adds a crushing, crushing effect to otherwise non-violent scenes. (The film is rated PG-13, which limits the amount of blood that can be spilled on screen — a necessary sacrifice, perhaps, given the film’s populist scope.) The film is centered on the people and gunspowder and horses are only secondary players in its battle sequences.

The woman is the KingThis blockbuster is more relatable than many others that are shown in summer. It’s burdened with many of the issues that typify big studio movies — overstretched CGI, an overstuffed plot — but it shrugs off those issues as easily as the Agojie flip enemy soldiers over their backs and into the dirt. The film is brimming with fire. More importantly, the film is full of love. It has love for life, freedom, culture and its brave and strong Black women.

The woman is the KingOpening in Theaters: Sept. 16