sNovember has many interesting new releases in store. For the most tragic reasons, however, one of them arouses particular interest: the sequel to the Marvel blockbuster “Black Panther”, whose main actor Chadwick Boseman died of cancer in 2020 at the age of only 43. If you don’t like the MCU at all, you should take a look at “The Menu”: A mixture of black comedy and thriller with a star cast is on the menu. Apropos: The unusual coming-of-age drama “Bones and All” with Timothée Chalamet (26) as a young cannibal also starts in November.
Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett, 64), Shuri (Letitia Wright, 28), M’Baku (Winston Duke, 35), Okoye (Danai Gurira, 44) and the Dora Milaje fight to save their to protect the nation from intervening world powers. As the Wakandans scramble to begin their next chapter, the heroes must band together with the help of elite warriors Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o, 39) and Everett Ross (Martin Freeman, 51) and chart a new path for the Kingdom of Wakanda.
Assessment:
Who will replace Chadwick Boseman as the superhero Black Panther in ‘Wakanda Forever’? Did screenwriter and director Ryan Coogler and Co. manage to make a virtue out of necessity – or do you notice “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” too much that events from reality provided the plot? Even those who didn’t want to join in the hymns of praise for part one could make a pilgrimage to the cinema interested in the answers to these questions. Action and comic connoisseurs should get their money’s worth anyway.
On a remote island, an enigmatic chef (Ralph Fiennes, 59) invites you to an opulent meal. Among the guests is a young woman (Anya Taylor-Joy, 26) who has arrived with her boyfriend (Nicholas Hoult, 32) and quickly realizes that there is more behind the facade of the extravagant restaurant than meets the eye first glance seems.
Assessment:
Ralph Fiennes and “The Queen’s Gambit” star Anya Taylor-Joy in a deeply black-humoured reckoning with unjust social structures, portrayed in the sometimes very pretentious cult of cuisine? That sounds delicious! Similar films, albeit in a significantly different setting (“High Rise”, “Snowpiercer”), also took on the criticism of decadence and are worth seeing. But “The Menu” is even seasoned with a pinch of “Squid Game”.
A tender love develops between Maren (Taylor Russell, 28), a young woman who must learn to survive on the fringes of society, and the spirited outsider Lee (Timothée Chalamet). As the two meet, a thousand-mile odyssey begins through the back roads, hidden passageways, and back doors of Reagan-era America. But despite their best efforts, all paths lead Maren and Lee back to their shocking past – and to the all-important question of whether their love for each other can overcome their differences.
Assessment:
A mix of coming-of-age drama and cannibal horror? It’s hard to believe, but this combination already existed recently: the French film “Raw” (2016) by Julia Ducournau (38) combined exactly these two aspects to create a violent female identity. Whether “Bones and All” proceeds as explicitly? Director Luca Guadagnino (51) can do both gaits, as he has already proven: in 2017 his soulful film “Call Me by Your Name” was released, also with Chalamet in one of the leading roles. Just a year later he shocked with his reinterpretation of Dario Argento’s (82) horror film “Suspiria”.
