I was excited for Queen & Slim. I really was. The reviews were pretty good, but that's not why I was excited. This is a great premise. A law abiding black couple find themselves on the wrong side of the law after killing a police officer in self defense. The movie is the chase and escape. I was pretty sure I was going to like it.
And then I watched it. Five minutes into the movie, the scene where they kill a police officer in self-defense happens. I was surprised that the movie did that so quickly, and realized that the next two hours - the movie is 132 minutes long - needed to be spent on them avoiding the police. That's when I was first worried. That is a lot of time. Bonnie and Clyde is just 111 minutes. Thelma and Louise is a similar length, but the killing doesn't actually happen until 20 minutes in.
And my worries were largely correct. This is not a movie that supports its length. It could easily be shorter and it would be a better movie if it were. This movie seems completely unconcerned with time. It is not clear how far they go, how long time has passed, anything. In one scene, I was completely surprised that they were evidently in Kentucky. When did they leave Ohio? Simple scenes were they pass "Leaving Ohio" on the highway or something to that effect would have helped. Also even an attempt at establishing a timeline. The movie is concerned with neither geography nor time.
The characters also seem remarkably unconcerned with getting caught, seeing as they make a million stops along the way. They stop at a fast food place, accidentally hit a guy, take him to the hospital (a completely ridiculous scene in my opinion). They go to a bar for a couple hours. They visit a grave. They stop in the middle of the completely empty highway to ride a horse. They playfully stick their head out the window on the highway, because again there are no cars around them. On the highway. In the middle of the day.
When they visit "Queen's" cousin, there's very little tension when the police show up, which... feels like they did something wrong there. He asks for a warrant, he says he'll get it, and then they just easily leave. Wouldn't a cop, with a person being as suspicious as the cousin, call for a warrant and just stay at the property while someone else gets it? Also, the couple at this point is extremely famous and he's her cousin. This information hasn't been passed to the New Orleans police?
But, the main issue, the thing that would forgive all other things, is that Daniel Kaluuya and Jodie Turner-Smith have no chemistry. At the beginning of the movie, neither character likes each other and they are apparently so convincing at that that when they do start to fall in love, it feels forced as hell. This is the soul of the movie. If you buy into the romance, the plot problems dissipate. If you don't, the plot problems amplify.
And I just didn't think the script or the actors sold their growing feelings for each other at all. Considering the climax of the movie requires you to have an investment of them as a couple, no investment means the whole movie fails for you. I think it's really that simple. If you buy into them as a couple, the movie probably works. If you don't, well there's really not much else to connect to on this movie.
Waithe and director Melina Matsoukas wanted to make an important movie. This is very obvious. I don't even think they would deny that. But they were so concerned with making an important movie, they forgot the most important thing about movies: make it good.
Here's the ironic thing. By emphasizing how important it was, the movie stopped being a movie and started being a message. This is no clearer than the scene where the two characters finally hook up and they intercut that with... a protest. Which was a very strange decision. Honestly they could have scrapped the whole protest scene and what that entailed (you'll know what I'm referring to if you've seen it). The kid wasn't given enough screen time for that to feel like anything but the movie delivering a message. I guess they felt like they needed it to be intercut with a sex scene is because the movie is otherwise completely from Queen & Slim's perspective. But it was a strange choice.
Queen & Slim is a deeply disappointing movie. There's not much tension and the plot is ridiculous, but not in an entertaining way, just in a way that doesn't resemble how real life works. The central couple lacks chemistry and the movie is boring. It's here where I note that this movie got good reviews, so I am just one opinion of many. But I truly don't think it's a good movie.
1.5/4 stars
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