Kings (2017 film)

Kings is a 2017 English-language drama film written and directed by Deniz Gamze Ergüven. The film stars Halle Berry and Daniel Craig.

The film had its world premiere at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, 2017. The film was screened during three days as part of Stockholm's International Film Festival held in November 2017. The film was screened at the Torino Film Festival in Italy before opening wide by Spring 2018.

Plot
Millie Dunbar is a single mother with eight adopted children in South Los Angeles. Her neighbour, Obie, is the only white man in the neighborhood. Together they form an unlikely team during the Rodney King riots.

Cast
Quartay Denaya played Latasha Harlins, while an uncredited Rick Ravanello played Officer Camello.
 * Halle Berry as Millie Dunbar
 * Daniel Craig as Obie Hardison
 * Lamar Johnson as Jesse Cooper
 * Kaalan "KR" Walker as William McGee
 * Rachel Hilson as Nicole Patterson
 * Issac Ryan Brown as Shawnte
 * Aries Spears as Keith
 * Callan Farris as Ruben
 * Serenity Reign Brown as Peaches
 * Reece Cody as Tiger
 * Gary Yavuz Perreau as Carter
 * Aiden Akpan as Jordan
 * Ce'Onna Johnson as Sherridanne
 * Kirk Baltz as Police Officer #1
 * Kevin Carroll as Manager
 * Peter Mackenzie as Police Officer #2
 * David Pasquesi as Howard

Production
Ergüven started working on the film when she graduated from La Fémis film school in 2006. It took her three years to write the script as she frequented South Los Angeles for research. In 2011, she was invited to the Cinéfondation workshop at the Cannes Film Festival, where she met Alice Winocour. After struggling to find producers and financiers for the project, she went on instead to write with Winocour and direct Mustang, which was released in 2015 and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. The success of Mustang finally allowed her to make the film.

Principal photography began on December 27, 2016 in Los Angeles. Filming lasted until mid February 2017.

Reception
On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 13% based on 38 reviews, and an average rating of 3.53/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Kings has good intentions, a talented cast, and the basis for an incredible fact-based story; unfortunately, they don't amount to much more than a missed opportunity." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 34 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".