Night of the Kings (2020)

Original title

La Nuit des rois

Directed by

Philippe Lacôte

Genre

prison film

Country

Senegal, Ivory Coast, France, Canada

Runtime

1h 33m

Rated

14

Rating

6.6 of 10 from 88 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

In a notorious prison in Ivory Coast, a young man is chosen to be the storyteller on a red moon night. To survive until dawn, he must keep the inmates enthralled with a tale of a legendary outlaw.

ritualisticmythiccommunalstorytellingtensedarkly theatricalsurrealprison-set

What happens

Night of the Kings (French: La Nuit des rois) is a 2020 fantasy drama film written and directed by Philippe Lacôte. The film is produced by Delphine Jaquet (Banshee Films, France), Yanick Letourneau (Peripheria, Canada), Ernest Konan (Wassakara Productions, Côte d'Ivoire), and Yoro Mbaye (Yennenga Production, Senegal). It was selected as the Ivorian entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards, making the shortlist of fifteen films. The film is also nominated for Best international film at the Independent Spirit Award 2021. The cast includes Koné Bakary, Isaka Sawadogo, Steve Tientcheu, Rasmané Ouédraogo, Abdoul Karim Konaté, Laetitia Ky, Nubel Feliz Yan and Denis Lavant. Announced in 2017 under the working title Zama King, the film premiered at the 77th Venice International Film Festival, with a follow-up screening at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival where it won the Amplify Voices Award. The film was one of two films featured in the Spotlight section of the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. It won the Black Film Critics Circle Award for Best International Film, the African American Film Critics Association Award for Best Foreign Film and the NAACP Image Awards 2021 for Outstanding International Motion Picture (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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