The wild 'auto-gestioned- prison of Abidjan becomes the theater of a fight for power, as the old 'chief' of the prison must submit his power, due to illness. This last night of the blood full moon a newcomer assumes the role of the storyteller, not knowing that this will end to his own death. To stay alive, he begins to tell the story of a fellow criminal in the slum of Abidjan, and how he was driven to his death.... (Full plot summary below)
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The wild 'auto-gestioned- prison of Abidjan becomes the theater of a fight for power, as the old 'chief' of the prison must submit his power, due to illness. This last night of the blood full moon a newcomer assumes the role of the storyteller, not knowing that this will end to his own death. To stay alive, he begins to tell the story of a fellow criminal in the slum of Abidjan, and how he was driven to his death.
Leave your thoughts about Night of the Kings.
| Chicago TribuneKatie WalshWhat happens in Night of the Kings is a piece of traditional oration and impermanent art, significantly marked by both its temporal and improvisational qualities. It’s both a power struggle and a ritual practiced by the collective within a microcosm of society housed under the oppression of the state, and a powerful demonstration of the transporting, and liberating, power of narrative. |
| RogerEbert.comRobert DanielsWith Night of the Kings Lacôte collapses the bounds between eras, and dissolves myth and reality, performance and remembrance, into one whole. It’s an assured, energetic piece of epic filmmaking, one that celebrates how storytelling, oration, and folklore teach us about our past so we might change our present. |
| PolygonKaren HanNight of the Kings occasionally strays too far into fantasy (and CGI), even though the more grounded scenes are what truly make the film sing. Still, it’s a stunning work. Lacôte’s tribute to the power of stories is a powerful story in and of itself, celebrating oral traditions and the rituals we create for ourselves in order to make life just a little more bearable. |
| VarietyPeter DebrugeWith this project, in which magical realism lends everything a mystical dimension, Lacôte confidently delivers on the promise of his 2014 Cannes-selected “Run.” |
| The Hollywood ReporterBoyd van HoeijThis captivating hybrid of a movie mixes fairy-tale and storytelling elements with a vividly drawn backdrop of heightened realism — no one would mistake this prison for a luxury resort — and relies on images and sounds as much as the human voice to tell its multiple stories. |
| Paste MagazineAndrew CrumpNight of Kings aesthetic dissonance is discombobulating, but the discombobulation is surprisingly pleasing in its headiness, as Lacôte plays with naturalist filmmaking and spectacle right out of The Lord of the Rings, intertwining the two so much that they are, at the end, inseparable from one another. |
| Boston GlobeTy BurrA tribute to the power of imagination and storytelling, and it’s like nothing you’ve seen before. |
| The Observer (UK)Mark KermodeThis portrayal of imprisonment may be authentically down to earth (Blackbeard’s rival Lass wants inmates to be managed “more rationally”, not as enslaved people but “customers”), but Night of the Kings proves most captivating in evoking the transformative power of the imagination. |
| The GuardianSteve RoseThe freshness of the approach, combined with the substance of the stories, works the same strange magic on the viewer as on the inmates. It is easy to be swept along. |
| Screen RantMae AbdulbakiDespite a weaker final act, Night of the Kings is spectacular, enthralling, and gripping. It's nearly poetic in its execution and that alone makes it well worth the watch. |
