12 Years a Slave Review

Last night I finally got a chance to see 12 Years a Slave. It was a movie that I regarded highly due to its story, actors and director. I even favoured it to win an Oscar even when I hadn't watched it yet. Well if you are asking if I changed my mind after watching the movie the answer is no! I actually want it to win an Oscar even more now.

The movie follows the true story of Solomon Northup portrayed by Chiwetel Ejiofor, a well educated free black man, being kidnapped and sold into slavery. Solomon is convinced by two men under false pretenses that he will be performing with his fiddle for a circus. Being exceptional with his fiddle and wanting to earn a little extra income Solomon accepts this offer. After his first day at the circus he wakes up in a dark room finding himself chained. He tries to explain to his kidnappers that he is a free man but failing to show his freedom papers when demanded he is then sold to a slaver's market.

His first "master" is a reasonable and just (just wouldn't be a word I would normally use to describe a slaver but when you compare him to the others just is the only word that comes to mind...) man named Ford played by Benedict Cumberbatch. Benedict's character is kind and nice towards Solomon and he even gives him a fiddle as a gift. But there is another ruthless white man that works on Ford's farm: Tibeats performed incredibly successfully by Paul Dano makes it his mission to kill Solomon after a number of disputes between them where he ultimately finds himself getting whipped by Solomon himself. 

I really do have to give credit to Paul Dano yet again. I have never seen him go wrong with any of his roles before and if he is given a real chance there is no doubt that he will get an Oscar himself in the near future. He doesn't get that many screen time in 12 Years a Slave but when he does he simply shines. But that doesn't mean I didn't want to kill his character. Oh yea he deserves to die which subsequently means he did his job right eh?

Consumed by hatred and filled with thoughts of revenge Tibeats hangs Solomon on a tree but then he makes him land on the tip of his toes. Barely alive Solomon tries to maintain contact with the land in order to survive for hours on end until Ford arrives and decides to give him away to protect Solomon from Tibeats and also to settle his own debt to Edwin Epps portrayed so magnificently by Michael Fassbender that he gets another nod from the Academy with yet another very well deserved Oscar nomination for his performance. 

What started off as a nightmare from the time of his kidnapping turns into a living hell for Solomon on Edwin Epps' cotton farm. Edwin Epps sees all his slaves as his "property" and does as he pleases with them. He sends the slaves that can't gather a standard of 200 pounds of cotton to get lashes as punishment.

The most successful cotton picker working on Epps' farm is a skinny young girl named Patsey performed by Lupita Nyong'o. Patsey is the first choice of Epps as his sex companion rather than his wife Mistress Epps portrayed by the magnificent Sarah Paulson (I just love her as an actress!). Mistress Epps is aware of this and always treats Pats accordingly. She beats and attacks her in the slightest chance she gets. Later on in the movie we find out that Mistress Epps doesn't even give soap to Pats which leads to in my opinion the most difficult scene to watch in the entire movie.

Believe me the movie is filled with them but this one simply takes the cake. Failing to find Pats on one his lusty visits on the day of Sabbath, Edwin Epps completely snaps when Pats returns from another farm that she visited in order to get soap to clean herself. However, Epps continues to believe that Patsey tried to run away. Mistress Epps insists on her husband to give Pats a good old whipping. Edwin Epps at first can't find the courage in him to strike Pats so he orders Solomon to do his dirty deed. Epps most likely unhappy about the intensity of the lashes she gets at the hand of Solomon and decides to take the whip and strikes Pats himself. As each strikes lands on Pats' back we see the brutal and bloody wounds emerge. I must admit I had to fight off the tears during this scene.

When other slaves help treat her wounds, Pats throws a heartbreaking look at Solomon with a hidden question. The question was simple "Why didn't you kill me when I gave you my blessing to do so?" Yes, earlier in the movie before all that chaos with the lashes Pats asks Solomon to drown her in the river and leave her body there. Of course Solomon rejects this. During the scene after the lashes, the guilty look on Solomon is clearly evident. I am pretty positive that Solomon regrets not killing Patsey as he passed on the only opportunity that he could have spared her from all that pain and misery.

One day Solomon meets Brad Pitt's character Bass. A worker that was hired by Epps to help with the construction work on the farm. Bass is a humanist character and he is strongly against slavery. He tries to make Epps understand that those slaves are human beings just like them and asks how he would feel like if there was a new law in the future for the enslavement of the whites. Epps of course explains that he sees them as his property and the enslavement of the whites would be against nature so in reality there would never be a law like that and ultimately completely avoiding the question.

Solomon feels like he can trust Bass and in the end it pays off. He asks Bass to send a letter to his friends in the north to explain his situation and bring his freedom papers. After explaining the danger of the situation for both Solomon and himself Bass says he would be glad to write his letter for him as it would be his duty as a human being. I must admit here that for the first time in my life I liked a character that Brad Pitt played. 

A couple of days later Solomon's friends along with the sheriff arrive on the farm and they bring him back to his family. From the closing credits we learn that the people who kidnapped and sold Solomon into slavery were tried in court but in the end walked free. Some justice huh?

Steve McQueen is completely right in his acceptance speeches when he explains there are still millions of people who are enslaved because of the colour of their skin. He goes on to saying that he hopes in the near future that slavery will be wiped off the face of the earth so movies like this will stop getting made. I agree with him wholeheartedly. Even in this era of great technology and all sorts of advancement disgusting things like these actually happen. It simply makes my bloody boil so much that I wanted to smash my monitor a number of times while I was watching this movie.

Sp the Oscars are tonight! I really hope 12 Years a Slave will bring home the Oscar for Best Picture. And I really hope that Steve McQueen will win Best Director. Up until now I haven't given enough credit to Chiwetel because I wanted to save him for last. I think he is among the strongest candidates for Best Actor and I am quite sure noone would be surprised if he were to win. I think it would be a worthy win for him. I want to wish good luck to the cast and crew at the Academy Awards tonight.

I want to end this post with an incredibly meaningful quote from Solomon. "I don't want to survive I want to live." Something to think about for every one of you. :)