Marvel’s Black Panther quickly became 2018’s biggest movie of the year, and it continues to break records domestically and all around the world. Recently, we were invited to have an exclusive interview with Black Panther’s Executive Producer Nate Moore, and watch the bonus features on the Blu-Ray, DVD, and Digital version of Black Panther (all available today). Here’s what Nate had to say about being part of this iconic film, how they narrowed the bonus features, and how this film became an international hit.
The Importance of Wakanda’s Women
While the Blu-Ray, DVD and Digital version of Black Panther includes a ton of additional footage and commentary, Nate was excited about us viewing The Warriors Within, which highlights the women of Wakanda. Letitia Wright, Lupita N’yongo and Danai Gurira stole the show in Black Panther, so sharing their importance to the film was necessary. Nate shared:
“The female characters are such a big, important part of this film. They are. And our actresses are amazing in how they portrayed the roles. So, you get to see a little bit of the behind the scenes of how they brought Okoye, Nakia and Shuri to life, which we think is fantastic.”
Choosing The Best Features For The DVD
With so many deleted scenes, behind the scenes extras, and even more footage that was left on the cutting room floor, we were curious as to how the team was able to decide what material would be included in the DVD. Nate told us it’s all about brainstorming.
“We have a brainstorming session where people get to pitch out ideas of what they think is interesting, and also what footage we have that we can show. The typical ones like deleted scenes and gag reels, we know we’re going to do, so we are collecting that footage all through production and post-production. And then at the end of the day, once we get a sense of what people are responding to out in the world, we can kind of craft our features based on that. This movie just happened to have a lot of really in-depth stuff, because the building of Wakanda was so complicated. Unlike other films like Captain America, which I loved and worked on, but that world is a bit more familiar to audiences. So, there’s less to tell. We had a lot of stories to tell from this one.”
International Love For Black Panther
With Black Panther breaking domestic and international records, we wanted to know what Nate thought of the international love of Black Panther, and its cast. He admits that with a cast that’s predominantly of African decent, they weren’t sure the film would travel well. What they decided to do was educate the audience before releasing the film worldwide.
“I think there is a natural hesitance in Hollywood to have a film of this size with a cast that’s predominantly African or African-American, you worry that it’s not going to travel. The truth is, it did. The good news was we weren’t concerned about it in the making of, so we didn’t adjust the storytelling to work in any specific direction. And Disney from the beginning, always put their best foot forward and said ‘well, we love the movie so we’re just going to figure it out.’ A lot of that was some pre-awareness stuff in Asia and South America where the character wasn’t as popular.
In some territories, Marvel films in general don’t do as well as you want. We knew that Civil War hadn’t killed. So, some people needed to be educated on who Black Panther was. But that’s all it really took.”
It was great to sit down with Executive Producer Nate Moore, and learn so much about the special features within the Black Panther DVD, Blu-Ray and Digital. Our family also received a fun Black Panther kit, to celebrate the release of this historical film! We made an afternoon out of watching the movie on our own television, and watching the bonus features and deleted scenes.
Black Panther is now available on DVD, Blu-Ray and Digital. Grab your copy today!
