Chiwetel Ejiofor in 12 Years a Slave Photo: Jaap Buitendijk
Steve McQueen’s third feature 12 Years A Slave is uncomfortable but unmissable viewing. The film follows the harrowing true story of Solomon Northup, a free black man from New York who was abducted and sold into slavery in the Deep South. Northup is shackled and stripped of every freedom – his family, his home, his name, and even the shirt off his back.
Chiwetel Ejiofor gives a fierce and dignified performance as Solomon Northup, earning him a best actor nomination at the upcoming Academy Awards. Northup is shipped to New Orleans and auctioned off like common livestock by the merciless slave trader Theophilus Freeman (Paul Giamatti). Freeman, whose sentimentally “extends the length of a coin,” is a man worlds apart from Giamatti’s affable portrayal of a limousine driver in Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks (currently in theatres).
After a stint of labour under the sympathetic command of estate owner William Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch), Northup is sold to the sadistic Edwin Epps and forced to pick cotton on his plantation. 12 Years A Slave reunites McQueen with actor Michael Fassbender, in a terrifying turn as Epps. On the plantation Northup also meets Patsey (Lupita Nyong’o, in a breakout performance), a young slave girl whose cotton-picking prowess catches master Epps’s cruel eye.
It’s difficult to watch 12 Years A Slave without seething at the rampant abuse of power and utter lack of humanity on display. Every time Epps cracks his whip, carving rivers of blood into Northup’s flesh, we experience a chilling reminder of humanity at its worst. Despite this overwhelming injustice, McQueen never sensationalises the action and allows Northup’s sobering story to speak for itself.
McQueen’s first two films were haunted by unflinching long takes where the camera refused to tear its gaze away from scenes of torture or physical excess. The long take also prevails in 12 Years A Slave. Cinematographer Sean Bobbitt, who collaborated with McQueen on Hunger and Shame, documents in unbroken detail one of the film’s most excruciating moments involving Northup, a noose and a muddy field.
Brad Pitt – one of the film’s producers – has a small yet vital role as a Canadian abolitionist who befriends Northup. Sporting his natural shoulder-length locks and beard, it seems the talents of the hair and makeup department were barely needed to transform Pitt into a rugged pre-Civil War traveller.
Set against a melancholic score by Hans Zimmer, 12 Years A Slave is remarkably poetic as well as emotionally raw. With nine Oscar nominations, including best director and best picture, 12 Years A Slave is the film to beat at the Academy Awards.
Two theatres were bursting at capacity during the preview screening of 12 Years A Slave at the Dendy Newtown last week, hinting at its popularity to come when it is released nationwide on January 30.
