'12 Years a Slave' is directed by Steve McQueen and is the true story of Solomon Northup, a free man who is kidnapped and sold into slavery prior to the Civil War.
Solomon Northup is played marvelously well by Chiwetel Ejofor and he will receive some Oscar attention. Solomon is an expert violinist and an educated, married man. He is sold into slavery and the audience is taken through the atrocities that occurred on many plantations in the South at that time. Solomon is sold to many slave owners and despicable people throughout the film but none worse than Edwin Epps and Mistress Epps, played brilliantly by Michael Fassbender and Sarah Paulson. As an audience member, I feared and hated these two characters.
This leads me to my issues with the film. This movie feels very much like a brutally accurate documentary. That would be fine if the film was in fact a documentary but it is not. '12 Years a Slave' is a narrative film and I didn't feel like I knew Solomon Northup. I was appalled and disturbed by what he went through but I wasn't emotionally attached to him because I didn't know him. There wasn't enough development in his character. While watching the film, I thought of 'GLORY' and how much I cared and learned about Denzel Washington's character. That type of emotion was lacking in '12 Years a Slave'. The movie has a 2 hour 13 minute running time, but that time felt doubled. Overall, the film has some amazing performances and at times marvelous direction by McQueen. The cinematography by Sean Bobbitt is beautiful. In the end, '12 Years a Slave' is a very mixed bag. It shines in some areas, but falls flat in some as well.
3/5 Stars
- George McCann
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