Tis the For Your Consideration season when film critics start making suggestions to their peers to see certain movies, so that film has a better shot at winning awards when it is time to vote. One such word-of-mouth potential nomination is “The Rivals of Amziah King” (2025), which I was going to skip because though I enjoy Matthew McConaughey, it seemed like a big ask to get invested in beekeeping, bluegrass and burglary. After one former critic enthusiastically recommended it, another current critic whipped her head around, made eye contact and said, “Yeah, it is good,” which is effusive and urgent, but it seemed as if it was leaving the theaters after one week, and no screeners are available at this time. There was urgent talk about the dwindling available showtimes and discussion of theater locations where it was still available. Being a critic with a day job, it seemed as if watching it was not feasible until a three-day weekend came around, and a distant theater or two had reasonable show times. The less that you know about the movie the better. While I am not as big a fan as most critics who absolutely fell in love with this film, the two hours ten minutes flew by. I never knew what was going to happen, and I left with a smile on my face. Yeah. It is good.
Roughly the first hour of “The Rivals of Amziah King” is worldbuilding and getting thrown into the middle of the titular character’s hurly burly, chaotic good life where the line between labor, leisure and largesse is blurred. Amziah (McConaughey) often carries and plays a mandolin with his friends, who also happen to be his neighbors and workers at King Honey, Amziah’s honey plant. If it sounds like a slow burn kind of movie, it is not. Between McConaughey’s fast talking, slow drawl, and writer and director Andrew Patterson constant camera movement, the momentum of the first half is like a runaway train with invisible tracks, but firmly in place and visible to the players. For something to look that natural and easy, it takes a lot of work and expertise. It is like keeping the volleyball in the air and getting the audience to the other second half of the story.
“The Rivals of Amziah King” establishes who are the firm fixtures in Amziah’s life, the newcomers and former acquaintances. Because Amziah is a loquacious man, and McConaughey has the gift of gab down pat, it is easy to miss awkward prose dump introductions among people who have allegedly known each other for quite some time. When one character explains to another how honey production works, something startling happens to keep the moviegoers off kilter. The most pivotal relationship depicted is between Amziah and his former foster daughter, indigenous Kateri (Angelina LookingGlass), whom he bumps into after a couple of good deeds later. He enthusiastically welcomes her into his life after checking whether she even wanted to see him. The “Barbie” (2023) line, “I’ll play the guitar at you,” could come to mind as an invitation to his home transforms into an impromptu music session with a reluctant Kateri provides vocals. Here is where LookingGlass’ performance becomes pivotal though it is understated. Her character cannot look desperate for attention otherwise Amziah is taking advantage and showboating to a captive audience. Kateri cannot be performing politeness otherwise the second half becomes more cynical. Kateri must seem as if she genuinely wants to be there and have a kinship with him, and it cannot get weird. Kateri becomes a kind of audience surrogate as her pleasure in joining this community becomes ours.
Patterson bathes the scene when Amziah introducing Kateri to his bees with with a golden light moving in slow motion. He explains bee society, which is a rough metaphor for human society depicted in the first half though each bee class is not cleanly mirrored in their human counterpart except for the queen. It is not a subtle point, but it still works because who does not love cheese. These scenes are like a passing of the baton to Kateri and are the calmest scenes in “The Rivals of Amziah King.” It is the calm before the storm.
Kateri carries the second half of “The Rivals of Amziah King” after she witnesses the effect that the underhanded honey businesses have on her new community. The overall effect of the story is to compare how Kateri reacts to Amziah and Amziah’s community, the king and his healthy colony, compared to Dob McCoy (Kurt Russell), his associates, which includes Wenyon Amos Stone (Chip Carriere), an unscrupulous beekeeper whose colony suffered from colony collapse disorder, and the effect that each man had on their respective communities. Even though the film is classified as a crime, drama, and thriller, do not expect anything too flashy for too long, but you will not be disappointed. Laws are broken so peacefully, understatedly and imperceptibly that you may miss the grave import of the actions when they occur, but the cumulative effect is like a puzzle that fits together neatly and is satisfying. Without the prose dumps, you would not even discern that McCoy was up to no good. Kateri becomes Erin Brockovich without the legal drama recourse.
“The Rivals of Amziah King” is subtlety bringing attention to an environmental crisis that threatens are food supply and an empathy/heart crisis that threatens the existence of human civilization. Bees make it possible to eat, but they are getting sick. They are currently the victims of people who prioritize short term profits over sustainability. Bees are not business. They are living beings. Similarly, we live in a society where people think that when they benefit, even if they screw someone else over, there will not be a negative blowback. The swarm of bees fighting back is like the people who may eventually get fed up when they see the tip of the iceberg, but they need someone else to bring it to their attention. If the movie suffers, it only equates government with law enforcement like “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” (2017). Does the movie also have blind spots in its depiction of what a healthy colony looks like?
On one hand, yes, “The Rivals of Amziah King” embodies a practical depiction of the Land Back movement and a harmony with nature having a ripple effect and offers harmony among people, which is literal thanks to the bluegrass. Shot in Alabama, but set in Oklahoma in a fictional city, Patterson pokes fun at the Benetton awkwardness embodied in Amziah’s ideal community as he points to socializing with Brazilians as his signal that he can be trusted but Patterson has blind spots of his own. It is still a community with only one Black person who has no discernible personal connections outside of his business associates turned friends, which is a kind of American work propaganda that flattens the reality of personal connections and implicitly encourages people to prioritize work as if it was the default personal relationship foundation. The ideal world is still majority culture as the default. Despite having a brother, Kateri only discusses him with love in concept, but as family, he is invisible compared to her new but burgeoning relationships with everyone in the movie. It happens. It is plausible. It may even serve the story well, but it is a reflexive tokenism characteristic of most movies in a film that otherwise defies convention.
Additionally, Amziah is a born-again Christian, and if it was not a contemporary film, a movie goer maybe could equate that with goodness, but in the error, ahem, era of Presidon’t, it could also imply some sinister things. By their fruits, ye shall know them, and Amziah seems like a good egg, but people can dehumanize a segment of society and have exceptions for the good ones embedded stemming from a desire to socialize. His no judgment relationship to people who break the law suggest that he is a Jesus follower in the Biblical sense, not the Christianist sense. Patterson’s signifiers of goodness will not be wholly reassuring to the entire audience, but to be fair, “Ain’t no one all bad or all good.” Amen.
