While watching Shaka King‘s awards breakthrough feature Judas and the Black Messiah, I found myself transporting back to 2017, when Christopher Nolan and Joe Wright both dropped complimentary films centered around the British experience in World War II. Frankly, it would be a monstrosity, but I bet there’s some fan editor who has attempted to graft those two films together to paint a full picture of that snapshot in time. Similarly, this year saw the release of Aaron Sorkin’s The Trial of the Chicago 7, which among other luminaries features two key figures in the Black Panther Party; Bobby Seale and Fred Hampton. Hampton, as played by Kelvin Harrison Jr., doesn’t get a ton of play in the film, but his narrative role is significant and memorable. Judas and the Black Messiah, on the other hand. is partially centered on Hampton’s journey, and even makes a reference to one of the more horrifying elements of that aforementioned federal court case.
It’s fascinating to try and come to grips with how this kind of synergy centers itself in the same year. Something in the zeitgeist perhaps? Probably. Judas is, of course, a completely different movie, but still carries enough of the prototypical biopic flourishes that these two films can comfortable sit together on the same shelf. Funny enough, despite making the title this time, Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya) is actually playing a supporting role in the proceedings. Instead, the person we spend more than half of our time following is William O’Neal (LaKeith Stanfield), a petty criminal who gets bagged by the FBI. In order to avoid doing hard time, O’Neal agrees to become a plant within the Black Panthers’ Chicago chapter and provide the Bureau with information to help crack down on the Panthers’ activities at the behest of J. Edgar Hoover (Martin Sheen). As you can imagine, it’s not that easy, particularly as O’Neal finds himself torn between his growing sympathy for the party’s mission, his growing relationship with Hampton, and the ever watchful eye and instruction from Agent Roy Mitchell (Jesse Plemons).
Here’s the thing: Stanfield is tremendous here. This is basically his most powerful knock on Oscar’s door in a career that continues to garner significant highlights in that direction. When we’re traveling along with O’Neal, we bear witness to his duplicitous actions and the moral conflict that continues to build within, from his bumbling attempts to not get made (there’s an especially good bit where he has to hotwire a car at gunpoint) to his ascendance to a leadership role in the chapter.
Were Judas just completely about the “Judas”, it’d be an outright homerun. It’s the elements of the script that focus on Hampton that dull the propulsive momentum of the film. Just when it feels like it’s going to go to the next level, we’re dragged back into another sluggish sequence with Hampton bearing the weight of the party, its movement, rivals, and a burgeoning romantic relationship (with Dominique Fishback‘s Deborah Johnson). That wobbly imbalance could even be navigable, but as the running time ticks on, O’Neal’s story starts to get significantly pulled into the Hampton story’s undertow and suffers by consequence.
There are other quibbles with the film, much of them centered on some of the mistakes King makes with material this important, such as a framing device that is inconsistently used, and an approach to scale that just comes across as larger than life to the detriment of the actual events (Sheen wears some especially Zack Snyder-esque makeup). But Judas’ flaws start at the conception stage, and a script that just needed better focus or more care for both of its titular figures.
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