Sadly, we lost the talented actor Chadwick Boseman on Friday following his protracted fight with colon cancer (doctors diagnosed the cancer back in 2016 but Boseman never spoke publicly about his illness). He achieved critical acclaim in several roles, notably portraying baseball pioneer Jackie Robinson in the film 42; however, his fans are likely to remember him first for starring as the Marvel Comics character T’Challa, aka the Black Panther. The 2018 film Black Panther was a box office smash, with Boseman becoming an inspirational cultural hero to many people of color.
I have not yet watched Black Panther, but I will do so this evening (ABC is airing the movie at 8:00 PM Pacific Time). Besides the opportunity to see and honor Chadwick Boseman, I will also enjoy being immersed in the imagined world of Wakanda, the fictional African country in which the movie is set. When the film debuted in 2018, many architects and urbanists praised the detailed integration of African cultural references and aesthetics within a utopian and futuristic depiction of the Wakandan capital of Birnin Zana, also known as The Golden City.
When I take the movie in, I’ll credit the vividness of the imaginary metropolis to the movie’s director, Ryan Coogler, and its Academy Award-winning production designer, Hannah Beachler. Critics have compared the fruit of their cinematic labors to other absorbing (albeit dystopian) visions of urban life, most notably Metropolis (1927), Blade Runner (1982), and Brazil (1985). Groundbreaking in their time, these efforts are notable because of their coupling of believability within the stories they told with high production values and virtuoso art direction.
I’ll reserve judgment of Black Panther until after viewing it. That said, based on reviews and the buzz that accompanied the movie, I expect to find it enjoyable and enthralling. Some of the comments by the architectural and urbanist press at the time of the movie’s release in 2018 were especially intriguing; here’s a sampling:
“In fact, Wakanda’s capital of Birnin Zana, is like no other city of the future depicted on screen: It’s lush, textural, and tactical, with a rich variety of architectural styles, building densities, and transportation systems, envisioned by production designer Hannah Beachler.
“But instead of the typical tropes seen in cinematic cities of the future—sleek glass towers of uniform height—Wakanda shows not a master-planned, top-down metropolis but a type of grassroots urbanism where the residents have customized their structures and their communities to fit their needs.
“There was also great praise for human-scale streets, walkable urbanism, and a rapid transit system that closely resembles a hyperloop—or maybe a mag-lev train.”
"Probably no movie has been more discussed in the context of utopian or dystopian city-making than 1982's Blade Runner. It’s still being discussed decades later. Blade Runner wasn’t a positive vision of Los Angeles, but it was an interesting vision. It was a cautionary tale, but also a fun conversation starter. I think Black Panther's Wakanda can be that new conversation.
There’s density in Wakanda, but it doesn't seem oppressive. I immediately saw urbanism at all scales. I saw tall towers, I saw midrise towers, and I saw human-scale urbanism. It looks like regional architecture as opposed to this anywhere-ness that we seem to have in our global architecture these days. I saw architectural expression that was not only organic, but of its place and of its culture.”
“Wakanda is not full of the sleek modern glass buildings audiences have come to expect when they imagine the future. Instead, it has a variety of architectural styles, many heavily inspired by traditional African architecture, but it also incorporates modern urban technology seamlessly. This is what makes the place, from the buildings to the transportation systems, so appealing (and surprising) to viewers.”
“What separates Wakanda from other places in the Marvel Universe is the fact that while it’s the most technically advanced civilization it has a strong history of culture as its foundation. As Moore explained, “So imagine a place that still has standing monuments that are centuries old, next to the most modern skyscrapers in the world. In the same way, they haven’t lost a lot of their cultural touchstones that other places have. They still worship, potentially the same gods they did when they first started. They still have rituals that are centuries old because they never had that sort of cultural imperialism that you’ve seen across the world. So it’s a place that really sits between being technologically advanced but also having a high value on their traditions.”
“Finding the value in traditional architecture but shaping it with a futuristic slant was the running vein for creating the world of “Black Panther.” “It was important for us to keep that tradition, because we wanted to honor and have reverence for the continent,” said Beachler, “and bring it to the screen in a way that you haven’t seen before, as being a prosperous place.”
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Our cities reflect who we are as people and as a society, and our buildings are the physical manifestation of our culture. It’s natural for us to be hopeful when presented with lavishly optimistic and utopian visions. When these visions are particularly compelling and revelatory, we have something to learn from them. For me, it’s enough that Black Panther’s at-once both futuristic and traditional Wakanda has prompted serious discussions about the nature of our real-world cities and the culture and technology that shape them. A good movie prompts us to think about and reconsider the status quo, while simultaneously stimulating and entertaining us. This is the power of art.
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