It’s 2022 and Hollywood is still risk-averse to fund movies that feature an all-or-mostly-majority cast of minorities in films. Despite box office successes such as The Color Purple, Slumdog Millionaire, Black Panther, Crazy Rich Asians, and Shang-Chi such movies feel too few and too far in-between that have a major impact on the box office. Next in line is The Woman King which is being advertised as the next big thing along the veins of the aforementioned movies and it could join that list. However, The Woman King feels more like woke Hollywood Garbage for a number of reasons that undermines the potential impact of this film.
On the surface, the movie’s title alone is blatant Hollywood wokeism. The Woman King? Do they mean a queen? Last time I checked, that is what a female ruler is called and a king is supposed to be the male equivalent. Looking at the movie’s title alone makes me think it is an insult to the great queens of history such as Catherine the Great, Nefertiti, Lakshmibai, Queen Elizabeth I, Cleopatra, Cixi, and Suiko; all great queens and empresses of their time which is undermined by this movie’s title.
However, maybe the title would make more sense if you were to look into the history of the Dahomey Amazons?
While they are referred to as Amazons from European traders who dealt with the tribe, they refer to themselves, in the Fon language, as Ahosi (king’s wives) or Mino (our mothers). The creation of these female warriors was in response to a lack of men due to the warlike nature of the Dahomey tribe. Originally formed to be elephant hunters, the unit gained further prominence so that, at its height, it comprised about a third of the Dahomey army.
Dahomey Amazons rigorously trained and had their own military uniforms while its military structure was similar to their male counterparts. Recruitment for the unit came from foreign captives, Dahomeon enrollment from the age of eight, volunteers, those involuntarily enrolled by disgruntled husbands and fathers, and even from the king’s wives (ahosi).
Training was intense with physical exercise, survival training, and pain tolerance. A couple of ways they trained was storming military defenses by going over acacia-thorn barriers and executing prisoners. Among the mino, they honed aggressive traits suitable for warfare, were not allowed to have children, or have any form of married life (though they were legally married to the king).
Their aggressive and intense training grew out of a mentality to be more like men. In their eyes, they would undergo a gender transformation with one Amazon chief stating, “As the blacksmith takes an iron bar and by fire changes its fashion, so we have changed our nature. We are no longer women, we are men.”
This ideology was observed and echoed by English naval officer Frederick Forbes who wrote, “The Amazons are not supposed to marry, and, by their own statement, they have changed their sex. ‘We are men,’ they say, ‘not women.’ All dress alike, diet alike, and male and female emulate each other: what the males do, the Amazons will endeavor to surpass.”
Aside from acting like and believing to be men, the mino also engaged with relations amongst the ranks.
Knowing this about the Dahomey female warriors, it is not surprising that Hollywood would want to push this movie as much as possible. Transgenderism is a hotly debated topic in the United States and I expect the movie to be heavy-handed on this topic. Even though the Dahomey changed their mannerisms to mimic men and not their physical bodies. So it makes me wonder if Hollywood will go with a transgender narrative for this movie or simply refer to it as lesbianism.
Aside from the possible topic of transgenderism or lesbianism being approached in the movie, the other topic is more prevalent: slavery. The Dahomey tribe relied heavily on supplying slaves to European powers. As a major player in the slave trade, Dahomey Amazons would participate in slave raids to keep the supply of slaves ongoing so that the tribe could trade for rifles, gunpowder, and alcohol. Slaves that weren’t sold were kept domestically to serve on the plantations.
There were even customs revolving around the capture and selling of slaves. Before selling the slaves, they would be forced to march around the “tree of forgetfullnes” that was supposed to result in them forgetting about their family, culture, and homeland so that their spirits would not return and enact revenge upon the Dahomey. Dahomey slaves were also sacrificed in ceremonies with around 500 being killed in ritual ceremonies with up to 4,000 killed in one recorded ceremony.
While originating as hunters and palace guards, the Dahomey Amazons participated in slave raids to help bolster the trade with European powers.
Unsurprisingly, it is the topic of slavery that is at the center of the controversy and reactions on social media regarding this movie and, combined with what is known about this particular group of women, makes me wonder how woke this will get. Personally, I couldn’t help but cringe when I heard the final line of The Woman King’s trailer which said, “We are the spear of victory. We are the blade of freedom.”
Calling yourself the “blade of freedom” is pretty hypocritical when the tribe’s power and wealth comes from slavery. It’s akin to hearing confederates claiming to fight for their freedom from the Union. You know, the freedom for the Democrats to keep their slaves that the Republicans wanted to take away from them by abolishing the practice.
The line is even more appalling to hear when you read what King Ghezo (played by John Boyega) is recorded to have said, when the British demanded the Dahomey stop with the human sacrifices and slavery,
“The slave trade has been the ruling principle of my people. It is the source of their glory and wealth. Their songs celebrate their victories and the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery.”
As for the Dahomey Amazons being the “spear of victory?” While they became a third of the military force, they were not the main force. They were primarily there to bolster the numbers and, while they were involved in slave raids, their performance on the battlefield was not great in the unsuccessful wars against the Abeokuta. In battle with the French, it was even worse. During the battle of Adegon, where French forces engaged in melee with the Dahomey, the Dahomey lost 86 regulars and 417 Amazons to bayonets while the French lost only six men.
There is no denying that the Dahomey Amazons were brave, determined, and aggressive. But effective as a military force? Doesn’t seem to be the case.
As for the movie’s title, The Woman King? It still makes no sense after learning more about them. The lead character is a general, not royalty, and already serves a king. So what is the explanation for the title?
Despite all of this, I would like it to be a good movie. But recently, when it comes to period pieces, Hollywood has been trying to rewrite history, giving them a modern spin that either obfuscates or completely ignores the true history of that time. You only need to look at movies about the Civil War or segregation to see this. Can you think of any time where a movie based on these two subjects talked about the political parties involved and what side of the divide they were on?
That’s what worries me about The Woman King. In trying to make a blockbuster film that is, I’m sure, a rah-rah moment for women, minorities, and queer/transgender folks the truth behind it all will be glossed over or ignored under the veneer that it is “based on powerful true events.”
This could have been an exceptionally great and informative movie about a part of the African slave trade. Expose us to a group of women that are interesting to learn about. Of how African-Americans were ejected from their homeland and sold to Islamic and European slave traders. Instead, the trailer gives off the air of woke garbage that will be nothing but empty calories in the hope of box office success. A fevered fantasy of wokeness rather than the sobering, and grounded reality of these extraordinary women and their history.
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