Movies: 12 Years a Slave

Score:  **** out of ***** (A-)

Long Story Short:  The widely praised and Oscar-hyped 12 Years a Slave is starting to open across the country, giving a wider audience the chance to see it.  Receiving raves as both an incredible story of an individual and a powerful, realistic portrait of slavery, it falls short, at least on the former.  The film benefits from some outstanding performances, particularly from Michael Fassbender, as well as from unapologetically startling, horrifying, disquieting scenes.  But the whole is significantly less than the sum of its pieces, unfortunately.


As I noted in last week's review, I've got a big change in genre for this week's film review - and then it's back to blockbuster territory for next week with the Hunger Games sequel.  After that, it's a little less clear what comes next; I'll have to look more closely at upcoming films.  And it's likely to be only film reviews for a little while:  the NFL season still has over a month until the playoffs, the NBA is well underway (missed my chance for a preview), and tennis season doesn't start back up until January.  I first heard about 12 Years a Slave early in the fall, as it became an early Oscar favorite at the Toronto (?) film festival.  It sounded like an interesting premise, so I wanted to see it; finally, it arrived in a theater near me last week.  12 Years a Slave was directed by Steve McQueen and stars Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender and Benedict Cumberbatch.

Leading with a few disturbing scenes of slavery, the film then flashes back to introduce Solomon Northup (Ejiofor) - a free man from New York.  Northup is a successful man with a loving wife and children, but he is approached by men who seek him for his violin-playing talents and he leaves to work with them.  All seems almost too good to be true, and it is.  One morning, Northup wakes to find himself chained in a dark room.  He soon discovers that he is being trafficked to the South as a slave.  As Northup does not act like other slaves - he wasn't born one - he finds himself passed among plantation owners.  For twelve years, Northup is forced into a horrible, nearly impossible balancing act - to keep himself physically alive, as well as to keep his hope alive so that he can someday return to his family and life as a free man.

12 Years a Slave enjoys the benefits of a great cast of actors.  As I say that, though, I must follow with a tempered review of Chiwetel Ejiofor's performance, which has been lauded by basically every major critic.  In individual scenes, I will agree:  Ejiofor communicates effectively with little direct dialogue, using body language well.  But in creating a compelling character throughout the course of the movie, he isn't nearly as successful - and I put 90% of the blame on the script and director (we'll get to that).  Michael Fassbender, on the other hand, is phenomenal.  Playing Northup's horrible master Epps, Fassbender makes him truly frightening and repulsive - yet utterly believable as a man whose behavior has become habit as much or more than choice, and one is who not a simplistic, pure evil, but rather a real man gone rotten beyond repair.  He commands every scene he's in, and conveys the despair of slavery more effectively than any single act of brutality.

Lupita Nyong'o, a virtual newcomer to acting, also does a stellar job as the slave Patsey.  Epps' favorite, Patsey is the most sorrowful victim of the film.  Nyong'o is silent and still for much of the time, virtually a hollowed out automaton created by Epps' and his wife's abuse.  But occasionally what's left of her soul breaks out when she is alone with Northup - so uncontrolled and desperate that even Northup is incapable of understanding her.  Benedict Cumberbatch plays Northup's first master, Ford, a much gentler man.  Cumberbatch fits the role well, a serious, dignified and slightly conflicted man, but here again is a problem with the script (more in a moment).  Among other notable roles, starting with the best, are Sarah Paulson (as Mrs. Epps, about as bad as her husband), Paul Giamatti (a brief role as an utterly remorseless, cruel slave trader), and Paul Dano (a mean but cowardly overseer).

12 Years a Slave is quite a story, but a difficult one to balance.  There are two equally powerful and important elements to get right:  Northup's experience of hell as an individual, and the institution of slavery as seen through this unique lens.  With this kind of story, Hollywood tends to have two styles, with plenty of films landing somewhere between:  you have the sentimentalized versions with exaggerated characters, dialogue and set-up emotional scenes; and you have the deadly serious (and usually depressing) realistic versions with little dialogue, story arc or emotional triumph.  For the story of 12 Years a Slave, the problem is that Northup's part lends itself to the former version, while the slavery part lends itself to the latter.

The film tries, consciously or not, to split the difference, mostly to Northup's detriment.  The original plan seemed to be to go for the "serious" path:  if you've read anything about this film before, I'm referring to the scenes of violence.  And no doubt about it, those scenes are effective:  from the near hanging that drags on mercilessly, to the whippings, to the slave trade and on and on.  And the Epps crew is a perfect setting for displaying the cruelty of slavery realistically (at least seems to); no huge, fancy plantation, this is a nowhere land led by nobodies; no towering, tyrannical owner, this is a pathetic human being whose sole power comes from the law being on his side.

However, the trouble for Northup starts early.  Precious little time is spent on Northup's pre-slavery life; I suppose this was meant to show how rapidly things could change, but what it really does is deny Northup a crucial base on which his character can build.  The whole process of transportation and trading is a shocking, brutal and effective one, but the Ford section gets things all out of whack.  There is no process of assimilation; we simply find Northup immediately getting in Ford's good graces (Cumberbatch gets to play the thinly veiled "gentle slave owner"), and then he abruptly blows up on the overseer (Dano) and that's it for the Ford part.  Only when Northup arrives at the Epps does his situation seem to sink in; but then, Northup's defiance as a free man also shows up at random times.  There's just precious little consistency (or at least smoothness in transition) in either Northup's character development or the film's path between hope for Northup and despair in slavery.  By the time we get to the ending, it's both predictable and ineffective.

***

Now, I know a lot of that just sounded pretty damning.  And I still rated the film an "A-".  What gives? Most scenes in the film (although there are some duds toward the end) are powerful and effective, keeping you riveted.  Most of the performances are superb (Fassbender, Nyong'o, etc.) or at least interesting (Cumberbatch, Giamatti, etc.).  But when you put them all together... there's just not enough synergy to make this a truly great film.  Most of the slavery aspects are superb and moving, when no one (not named Fassbender) is speaking - but there are enough Hollywood-ized scenes and dialogue that it doesn't all fit together (Brad Pitt's small part is the coup de grace here).  And Northup is sadly generic, saddled not just with the contrasts mentioned above, but also with the lack of an effective starting point to work from.

Maybe I wasn't in the right frame of mind when I saw 12 Years a Slave.  But I'm doubtful; when that happens, my opinion of a film tends to shift over the course of the week (on average) between when I see the film and when I review it.  If anything, my opinion of this film has solidified.  I can't speak for what the critics saw in this (or, possibly, blinded themselves from) to deem it an instant classic.  What I can say is, yes, there are great performances (Ejiofor's overrated one - due to script and directing - aside) and powerful scenes.  Those are good enough to get it to "A-".  But, thanks to an inconsistent script and a director who couldn't keep it all together, it is not a cinematic great taken as a whole.