Directed by Steve McQueen
8/10
This, they say, is
destined to get every meaningful Academy Award this year. Terribly likely. 12 Years A Slave has so much
going for it: subject matter (you don’t want to mention it first, but you do
mention it first), breathtaking cast, Steve McQueen’s charismatic directing. In
a year when the best films aren’t even nominated (Blue Jasmine and Inside
Llewyn Davis were left out in the snow, inexplicably), 12 Years A Slave has every reason to do it in style.
And it’s okay, 12 Years A Slave is a better film than Argo. Steve McQueen is a great director,
with style and chops to make this minefield of a topic (just imagine how
pathetic and one-dimensional it could be) look intelligent and artistically
compelling. A little artsy, too, but that doesn’t hurt. Hunger and Shame were
very good, but you feel it’s here that McQueen makes his breakthrough and comes
unto his own. It’s his big Money
moment, after a couple of brilliant left-field gems like Other People and The Rachel
Papers. This time around it’s not just Michael Fassbender. This time it’s
Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s Brad Pitt.
And it’s, yes,
American slavery of mid-19th century. Not Tarantino’s comic-book look,
not Spielberg’s sideway glance; this is dead serious, full-on stare. The film
is based on the memoirs of Solomon Northup, and follows his 12 years of hard
labour and humiliation. Different owners, beatings, despair. It’s a relatively uneventful
story (in cinematic terms, of course), which is both a blessing and a trap. On
the one hand, it gives McQueen a great opportunity to explore the life around
Solomon in every cruel and brutal detail; on the other hand, it makes McQueen
resort to rushed, episodic scenes that are supposed to bring spice to the
passive, occasionally boring narrative. He mostly succeeds, and the film looks
gripping more or less all the way through.
As for the acting,
it’s consistently good. Chiwetel Ejifor (as Solomon) masterfully carries his
humble dignity around him from beginning to end. Cumberbatch is reasonable as a
kind-hearted plantation owner. Fassbender is the film’s most complicated
character, all crooked and confused, the sort of Nazi officer in love with a
Jewish girl; you can’t look away. Pitt I’m not so sure about; he is mostly
hidden behind a Southern accent and a beard, but I guess he does what he was
asked to do.
Still, for all its
talent and guts, 12 Years A Slave
doesn’t really overwhelm emotionally. Maybe it’s the rushed ending, maybe it
gets a little too technical in places. Thus, my resolution would be an Oscar
for Steve McQueen, and a hilarious best picture award for American Hustle. No, this film wouldn’t be a bad choice, obviously
not, but God knows La Grande Bellezza kicks
this one out of the window. Last year’s main-category nomination for Michael
Haneke’s Amour was a pleasant
surprise, but this time the Academy just blew it again.
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