It was supposed to be a quick trip for Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a 30-something New Yorker who in 1841 went on tour in the South playing the fiddle. It turned into a nightmare as this free black man was kidnapped and turned into a slave, a story that has now been adapted into the heartbreaking film 12 Years a Slave.
The story starts out with Solomon’s quaint life in New York, where he is a happily-married free man with two young children. He is respected and even beloved in the community but such memories are forgotten when he takes up the opportunity offered by two strangers to go on tour playing music. Along the way, his life changes and he is forced into slavery. Without the papers declaring him a free man, he is left to rot in a cold prison until he can be sold like a piece of meat.
Photo Credit: Collider.com
The scenes that follow powerfully show the grotesqueness of slavery. Stripped naked and sold, Solomon clings to his past life while suffering through the present. A slave trader ironically named Freeman (Paul Giamatti) says “My sentimentality extends the length of a coin” and his feelings are shared by many others. They are certainly shared by a psychotic plantation manager named Tibeats (Paul Dano), whose inhumanity is on clear display.
During his twelve years of captivity, Solomon confronts a wide variety of experiences. From his attempt to run away (which ends with him witnessing a hanging firsthand) to being asked to torture a fellow slave, he sees a world that few could ever survive. There are inevitably kind-hearted people he meets along the way (including a scruffy Brad Pitt) but most of his experiences are raw and difficult to watch.
Photo Credit: Collider.com
Showing a wide-ranging series of situations, 12 Years a Slave powerfully brings this difficult subject to the big screen. It succeeds by showing the inhumanity of the practice while dwelling on how normal it once seemed to those who witnessed it firsthand. Some of the most heart-breaking scenes shown here feature sick acts of violence—including a man in a noose struggling to remain standing in order to survive for hours on end— while others (including children) think nothing of it. The barbaric practices seemed normal to them.
From start to finish, the acting here makes this story stand out. Of particular note are Michael Fassbender, who plays a demented slave owner who rapes one of his slaves, and Lupita Nyong’o, the victim of his attacks. Both will likely be awarded for their powerful performances during award season. Credit should also be given to Ejiofor, who captures the changing emotions of his character. Solomon is indeed a complex character who often must hide his educational background and his emotional state to survive. Educated men don’t survive long in the slave trade, he is told, and neither do people who can’t let go of the families they’ve lost. (“Your children will soon be forgotten,” one female slave owner tells the newest addition to the plantation.)
Photo Credit: CBSNews.com
Films like 12 Years a Slave are difficult to watch but powerful to experience. It’s an important story that never shies away from its harsh depiction of slavery. Easily one of the year’s best films, director Steve McQueen has succeeded in telling an incredible true story without cleaning it up to make it more palatable to more general audiences. This film stands as it is and should be applauded as a cinematic achievement.
My review: A
12 Years a Slave Trailer
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