Black Panther Director's Cut

Ryan Coogler, Black Panther’s director has gone underground to work on what is known in the business as the director’s cut.  Just kidding. Ha! Ha!

It is called a cut because movies used to be shot on film which was edited by literally cutting out film frames and joining them with splicing tape.

Remember the hair on the floor as the barber cut your hair?   Old school film editors had discarded film pieces under their chairs. 

It’s all digital now.  Shoot on digital. Edit on digital.  Director’s cut on digital.  Final cut that you watch as you munch the popcorn, is digital.

The director’s cut is personal.  That is how directors would like to see the finished product, based on the script and scenes they shot, but they don’t have the final say, if they are hired by Disney or any other major studio. 

People who invested money in the movie want it edited in a way they believe with rake in money and more money.  Black Panther is doing just that and I’ve stopped counting.  It broke my digital calculator. But seriously, I must call Ryan Coogler and kindly request to see what he had in his director’s cut, before Disney made changes.  I hope to see the following.

·         More scenes that will explain the guns on the wall behind the artwork and more of Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) when he was a little boy.

·         Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) is a spy.  She is in a truck with about ten girls.  Did Boko Haram kidnap them or they are just girls that were going to be sold somewhere?

·         Hopefully the director’s cut will have more of the Queen Ramonda, played by Angela Bassett.

·         It will have more of the dances.

·         It will have love scenes of Okoye (Danai Gurira) and W’Kabi (Daniel Kaluuya).  They fought on opposite sides towards the end of the film and W’Kabi said, “Will you kill me my love?”

Hopefully, Ryan Coogler did not delete his director’s cut of Black Panther.

By:  Nonqaba waka Msimang.