To call
12 Years a Slave Oscar-bait is an insult, reducing
it to little more than another star-studded biopic. True, it’s both
star-studded and a biopic. Still, director Steve McQueen’s adaptation of
Solomon Northup’s autobiography of the same name goes beyond these
simplistic descriptions. In its essence, this film is a study in human
nature, and what it means to survive.
The premise is exactly as the title suggests: Solomon Northup,
portrayed by Chiwitel Ejiofor, is a free black man living in the North
until he’s kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South, first under the
relatively merciful William Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch), but later
under the sadistic, violent Edwin Epps (Michael Fassbender). This
summary can’t even begin to do justice to the atrocities Northup suffers
under slavery. Yet somehow, the film does.
The film moves forward steadily, showing the horrors Northup
experiences without either heavy-handedness or weakness. This narrative
rhythm becomes overt in the film’s soundscape; many scenes feature slave
chants, the repetitive sounds of axes, driving drums, or other
background sound effects such as a boat’s thumping paddlewheel. Even the
cracking of whips forms a constant beat. The moments of silence allow
us to breathe, creating pauses where the previous scenes and horrors
truly sink in. But even these quieter segments are harshly powerful,
drawing their strength from details: the gazes between Northup and his
fellow slaves, or the shadows cast by a hangman’s rope.
The film also refuses to revel in the violence inherent to such a
narrative. Whippings and beatings are frequent occurrences, but often
we’re shown the victims’ faces or bodies contorting in pain, rather than
the blood and bruises they sustain. In doing so, the film shifts the
focus away from the violence and onto its human consequences. In one
horrific scene, Northup is strung up and nearly killed by an overseer
who wants him dead. However, once his persecutors are driven off, he is
left dangling, toes barely skimming the ground, for several hours.
Instead of close-ups, we see his body silhouetted against the changing
sky, and we’re left to imagine his suffering from the slight jerks and
twists he makes in keeping his feet touching the ground beneath him. The
only truly gory scene is when a fellow slave, Patsy (Lupita Nyong’o),
is sentenced to a public whipping, which flays her skin and leaves her
with a network of bloody lines. The camera doesn’t linger, but it
doesn’t shy away from showing the raw flesh of her back. The blood
serves to underscore the viciousness of Master Epps, who now has not
only raped and controlled Patsey, but publicly tortured and humiliated
her.
As Patsy, Nyong’o is one of the breakout stars of the film. She plays
a young woman who has been dealt a terrible hand—enslaved, female, the
subject of both the master’s “affections” and the mistress’s hatred.
Nyong’o uses her eyes especially to convey her deeply soulful torment,
drawing them carefully blank when Epps molests her, but allowing us to
see her vivacity when she, in a moment of free time, crafts a handful of
corn-husk dolls. Fassbender as Epps is also remarkable, representing
the snarling, hateful sort of person that slavery as an institution
breeds. He doesn’t just own them for his livelihood—he truly believes
that they are chattel.
In the end, though, Ejiofor is the star, and with good reason. He
brilliantly paints us, within the first few minutes, a picture of
Northup’s free life—a wife, two kids, musical talent, steady work—and
spends the rest of the film showing us what happens when that picture is
slashed to pieces. We see his descent into depression as his situation
begins to sink in, and his struggle to survive. Ejiofor shifts from
determination to despair, as Northup accepts the reality of his life and
what is necessary.
12 Years A Slave TRAILER 1 (2013) - Chiwetel Ejiofor, Brad Pitt Movie HD
