22/04/2021
Judas and the Black Messiah
Release date: February 12
Director: Shaka King (Newlyweeds)
Cast: Daniel Kaluuya, LaKeith Stanfield, Jesse Plemons, Dominique Fishback
Why it's great: It's hard to think of another recent movie as propulsive as this historical drama with significant Oscar buzz about the murder of Black Panther chairman Fred Hampton, portrayed in extraordinary fashion by Daniel Kaluuya, and the FBI informant (LaKeith Stanfield) who led the killers to his door. Shaka King's film is simultaneously both radical in tone and tense in ex*****on, shifting perspective between Hampton and William O'Neal, a car thief played with jittery energy by Stanfield, who is offered lenience if he provides J. Edgar Hoover's bureau, intent on quashing the Black Power movement, with information on the charismatic leader and orator. Judas and the Black Messiah avoids any of the sentimentality that can typically invade true stories, helped by Stanfield's deft work as a man who slowly realizes the danger of his lack of politics.
