Directed by: Steve McQueen
Starring: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Lupita Nyong’o
Rated R, 134 minutes
Michael Fassbender (left) and Chiwetel Ejiofor star in “12 Years a Slave.” (Courtesy photo)
A movie is only as good as the impression it leaves you with. There are some movies that are good, even great, but then toss in a throwaway ending, or keep the camera rolling for too long, leaving me with a lingering sense of frustration about the masterpiece that could have been. I felt that way about “The Shawshank Redemption” and “The Skin I Live In,” for example, and now I’m adding “12 Years a Slave” to that list.
So let it be known that five out of the 134 minutes this movie runs are unsatisfactory.
A true and horrific story out of pre-Civil War America, “12 Years a Slave” tells the story that its title suggests. An upstanding free black man from New York, Solomon Northrup (Chiwetel Ejiofor, “Children of Men”), is kidnapped and sold into slavery. Suddenly and cruelly made to live as less than human, he must find a way to survive. He knows he can’t act like the high-class citizen he rightfully is, since his new masters will only make his life worse.
So he tries to blend in. After a few owners, among whom he garners a reputation for not following all the rules, he ends up on the plantation of Edwin Epps (Michael Fassbender, “Shame”), a brute and stupid man with little more strength than what his whip provides. If he can survive his time on Epps’ plantation long enough for his family back in New York to be notified of his location, they can come save him. They finally do, but only after he spends 12 years in the unspeakable hardship of slavery.
Where this movie excels is where Steve McQueen’s (“Shame”) movies tend to stand out—in the unflinching willingness to show us what we don’t want to see. There isn’t another slavery movie like “12 Years a Slave.” Other movies show us euphemisms or toned down versions of events or, in rare cases (namely Tarantino’s “Django Unchained”), hyper-real exaggerations. McQueen’s version of events is blunt and gruesome, but without dwelling or focusing on either. We watch naked slaves shamefully wash themselves in large groups; McQueen makes us watch the whip come into contact with slaves’ backs; he doesn’t turn down the volume on slaves who moan with grief.
Technically excellent writing gives the film much of its power. Not all characters come through fully and not all dialogue sounds as good as it probably looks on paper, but the scenes progress naturally despite their episodic nature. Most impressive and satisfying are the scenes that are nearly wordless; screenwriter John Ridley lets actions speak for themselves, and McQueen makes those actions come to life in horrifying clarity.
His direction of actors is strong all around, but none are as strong as the female characters in the film. Lupita Nyong’o (TV’s “Shuga”) is excellent as Patsey, the unfortunate slave at the center of Epps’ affections, whose few attempts to take control of her life fail miserably. It is because of her that the ending of the movie irks me; the second-to-last scene includes her, but the last one does not. (That is, the last one could and should have been cut.) Adepero Oduye (“Pariah”) is also very strong as a mother who, separated from her children, reminds Solomon of the true bleakness of their situation.
Fassbender, meanwhile, is very good as an impotent and belligerent slave driver, a clear personification of the insecurity and indecision that drive men to do terrible things to compensate. And while Ejiofor is strong enough to carry the film, he doesn’t elevate it the way the supporting actors do. I think this is less a reflection of his abilities and more a reflection of how the script draws out his characterization a little more than it needs to. Less is more, but sometimes Ridley and McQueen err on the side of more.
And that’s really the movie’s only flaw—including more than it has to. Most of the time, McQueen knows exactly how long to wait, how long to linger on an image, so that we see it exactly the way he wants us to see it. But it’s little instances (and, of course, the ending) that can make “12 Years a Slave” feel like Oscar bait instead of an earnest and sincere depiction of history—like simply a good movie instead of a masterpiece.
Danny Eisenberg is a 2010 graduate of the Bromfild School and is currently a student at the University of Pennsylvania.
