12 Years a Slave

[Babycakes]

I honestly don't think I'll be able watch this.

If it's as intense, harrowing, and realistic as the early reviews imply it is, I don't think that I'll be able to stomach it. America needs a film (not just a film, but an honest documenting of what slavery was, the damage it wrought, and its enduring legacy) like this to help quash the sentiment of the antebellum south. Not an over the top western like Django, or a soap opera cum romcom epic like Gone With the Wind, that depicts slaves as sassy, happy, loyal, simple, and flat-out background players to the turbulent lives of their white owners.

People owned over people in this country. That happened. That was real. Forced labored. Whippings. Lynchings. Rape. And that's just the physical devastation. Not to mention the systematic psychological destruction of an entire race, and the impact it had/s on the descendants on both sides.

Sigh. I want to see it, but I don't want to see. I should probably watch it at home with a carton of Häagen-Dazs Carmel Cone, and a box of kleenex.

[kostgard]

I'll probably see this next weekend (no time this weekend). The reviews have been excellent.

I think for me it will be like Schindler's List - I saw it once. I'm very glad I saw it and I think everyone should see it. I never want to see it again.

I was exhausted after SL. Emotionally and physically drained. It was a horrible story to witness, but I think an important one. And I can't imagine watching it more than once - I really could never see a situation where I would pop "Schindler's List" into the DVD player and curl up on the couch on a rainy Saturday or be like "Hey! Schindler's List is on HBO!"

If "12 Years..." is as powerful as SL, I think it should be required viewing. But only once. And I'll probably go to an early Sunday afternoon matinee where it's just me and a handful of old people and no one will notice if I turn into a sobbing mess.

ETA: Or maybe I'll watch it when it finally decides to open in my city. Limited release? What the hell?

[Deleted]

It's not open here yet either, we'll probably get it in a couple weeks.

I read the book for a class back in middle school and they showed us the the old PBS movie of it, I'm looking forward to seeing a better adaptation of it.

[magazinewhore]

It was brutal, but has stayed with me for several days after I saw it.

Full disclosure: I teach history of women's literature, so we read slave narratives (among other works by women who were slaves) and it's amazing how little young people understand about the past (and many of my students are minorities; I teach at a City College). Initially, I get a lot of students who don't understand why slaves didn't fight back or who claim "they" would never have done what someone told them to do. I think that's really the heart-rending part for me is that many don't get that society was set up to support it, there were no laws against it (quite the opposite). Or to protect women from abusive husbands or workers from being exploited by business owners. Slowly as the semester goes on, they start to "get" why it would have been impossible to fight against it. Anyway, I was both excited about the movie because it dramatizes what we've read, but I was also (a bit) annoyed because I thought about Harriet Jacobs, who wrote that while slavery was terrible for everyone, it was especially bad for women because of the widespread sexual abuse. I'm glad the movie was made; I admire the fact that Brad Pitt is using his powers for good (his company produced it), but I wondered when the female slave story would be front and center. I realize the story did feature a woman's plight (and the tension between her and the slave owner's wife), but she wasn't the protagonist.

Anyway, the movie was really powerful.

[bklynred]

Like similar pictures, I have a hard time with the theme but I know I need to see it because 1)it's part of my personal history and 2) its box office will dictate if other movies like it get made. Plus, I've heard the cast is perfect, there's great writing... I'll just have to take kleenex and lots of cleansing breaths...

[Martini Girl]

A nice companion piece to this film is a little seen gem from 2006 called "Amazing Grace". It's a true story of one member of Parliament - William Wilberforce- who waged a multi-year battle to abolish the slave trade in Britain. He finally succeeded in 1806. Cumberbatch is in this one too. He plays 24-year-old William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister of Britain, and good friend of Wilberforce.

[baileydash]

Critic Wesley Morris has written a magnificent analysis of the movie for Grantland.

[mementomori]

It's taken me a week to process the movie. Morris brings up an unsettling point that I realized after the fact: the movie is eerily quiet. It's as if McQueen wants the viwer completely enveloped in all slavery has to "offer". He willfully rejects the passive participation of merely watching the film, one is engaged, and to a lesser degree brutalized by the film. I watched this last Friday in a packed theatre in Times Square. The audience seemed completely mesmerized by the film. I am seeing it again with my sister today. There is no justice in this world if both McQueen and the ever excellent Ejiofor are not nominated. Alfred Woodard arrives to steal a scene and leave her mark and Lupita N'yongo and Sarah Paulson are terrific. Fassbender is also very good but the awards season really needs to be about the director/lead actor duo.

[Deleted]

Just got home from seeing this, I definitely need a couple minutes to compose myself when it ended. If there's any justice in Hollywood it'll win ALL the Oscars.

[baileydash]

Having read many of the reviews, I was prepared for the brutality of the movie. However, I didn't expect it to be so moving. But if ever a movie-ending flood of tears was earned, it was with this film.

Practically everyone involved with this film brought their A game.