For all black artists, slavery is a themes of a stone's heart. The heavier the heavier, the easier it is to play abnormally, attempting to strive for the epic, but accidentally loses his personal style. Steve McQueen, the elder in his family who had experienced slavery firsthand, not only had the ambition to make a slavery movie, but also a method. "I have been looking for a perspective to enter slavery, and then I found this book "Twelve Years of a Slave", a free man who was sold as a slave because of kidnapping. The perspective of choosing a free body is because, in fact, Every one of us can be him." Such a choice is undoubtedly wise. The audience is as unfamiliar with slavery as the deceived Solomon, so he saw the cruel details for the first time through his eyes. At the same time, it can arouse resonance thinking, when the most fundamental dignity is violated, when all the original identities are deprived, how one should perceive oneself and how to exist in the extreme destiny.
In twelve years, Solomon went from being innocent at the beginning to vindicate his family identity, to quietly humiliating, to waiting for an opportunity to escape and then giving up, to the point that he seemed to believe that he was just a slave who had escaped from Georgia and was trafficked again. Someone died suddenly in Tanaka's work, and he sang sad spiritual songs with other slaves at the funeral. You and I are no different. The violin that once brought him honor and a good life now also brings him shame. In the end Solomon broke it with his own hands, and the name of his wife and children secretly engraved on the violin.
The most brilliant and heart-wrenching character in "Twelve Years of Being a Slave" is Patsey, the little black slave girl. She is ingenious and can gather the most cotton. She can weave small dolls with corn whiskers and have big eyes like wild little mothers. In the middle of the night, when everyone is bombarded by drunken slave owners and forced to sing and dance, she is the only one who dances comfortably, as if she doesn’t know. Worry and shame. However, Patsey secretly asked Solomon to help her sink into the lake at night and bury the body in a place no one knew. In the film, she was finally tied to a wooden stake and flogged, her back resembling a plowed black ground, just because she wanted a bar of soap and wanted to be clean. Turns out she understands. For nearly ten minutes, the long shot of Steve McQueen followed the slave owner's whip and penetrated into the flesh of the abused slave girl until the last moment of fainting.
In the two-hour movie, Steve McQueen's power is always steady, blunt, and slowly advancing. Sometimes I feel calm and hopeless while watching the movie, and the narrative structure is not compact. After thinking about it, maybe this is the most real feeling of being a slave. Those who feel bored after watching "Twelve Years of Being a Slave" can immediately watch "The Rescued Jiang Ge" for balance.
Steve McQueen, a visual artist, has an enviable talent for the beauty of the picture and can use a camera to make oil paintings. The magnificent scenery of the Mississippi River, the ballads of the serfs when they picked cotton, the long years, day after day, and the cruel beauty like a black fairy tale. Sean Bobbitt, the photographer behind the McQueen trilogy, praised the director very much: "A person who is not bound by conventions and rules, is talented and emotional, fearless and infinite." And he is still in his prime of life. In line with Hollywood's need for racial diversity, he deserves to be named the most anticipated black director after Spike Lee.
I must frankly say that viewers who are not of African descent are indeed weaker in empathy with the history of the suffering of black slaves. (Single-family cabin, meals with meat and vegetables and fruits, how many whips? Sorry, Chinese audiences have seen too many worse.) But this does not prevent me from still treating Steve McQueen He has always expressed admiration for his bravery in choosing a heavyweight theme. McQueen seems to be naturally interested in individual lives in desperate situations, whether it is a revolutionist in a prison in "Hunger", a sex addict in "Shame", or The shackled slaves in "Twelve Years of Slaves", he saw these prisoners, holding up their trapped beast-like souls. I was even moved by his perception of all angles in handling extreme subjects. In Steve McQueen’s films, there are political prisoners fighting on a hunger strike, prison guards headed by the Revolutionary Party, and riot police officers shivering; there are lewd and beast-like sex addiction brothers, and there are also love-loving brothers. , Innocent and stubborn as a child’s sister; there are black slaves who have been exploited and insulted, and there are slave owners of various colors who represent different positions. Some are soft-hearted but unable to act, some are cruel and take it for granted, some are mysterious and noncommittal, and some slaves can use the system to change their status and become a master. By displaying the picture scroll as complete as possible, "Twelve Years of Being a Slave" broadened people's understanding of the black slave system in the United States. This complete system that has lasted for hundreds of years is more than just terrorist exploitation.
Brad Pitt, as one of the producers, found himself a true, good and beautiful role in the film-a sympathetic and friendly Canadian who advocated the abolition of slavery, and finally rescued Solomon. Twelve years later, Solomon finally entered the New York home. The youngest daughter embraced the baby to greet him. His grandson was named after his father. The new life signals that the new heavens and the new earth are finally coming. Twelve years, in the East is a natal reincarnation.
As early as when Steve McQueen finished his feature-length debut "Hunger", he said in an interview with the British film magazine "Video and Hearing": "Such things continue to happen, both in the past and in the present. This is the case. It’s a story that has been swept under the carpet. It’s time for someone to lift the carpet up and show it to everyone.” In "Hunger", the IRA revolutionaries who are dying of anger have the original intention of a teenager running through the mountains. In "Shame", the most absurdly indulgent New Yorker has the saddest, chaste and affectionate eyes; in "Twelve Years of a Slave", Solomon, who lost everything as a slave, is under McQueen’s lens, but is better than any A slave owner must be civilized, decent and noble. He said: "I don't want to just survive, I want to live."
There are also many meaningful and good stories that have been swept under the carpet and gradually forgotten by people. It takes enough courage to raise the carpet. Only a truly fearless and free artist can have the courage to raise the carpet and make movies. From this point of view alone, Steve McQueen, who has won at the Cannes and Venice Film Festivals, is worthy of the biggest voice and support of this year’s Oscar season. He is taking a solid step towards the realm of contemporary masters. .
(Already published in "Global Screen" 2013 Yearbook)
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