12 Years a Slave
(2013)
Steve McQueen’s third feature has been garlanded with praise
from every quarter, so much so that its instant classic status seems
unassailable. Tackling weighty subject matter (such as slavery, or the
Holocaust) sometimes seems to invoke pre-programmed critical plaudits, so it’s
as well that 12 Years a Slave
deserves them. Yet I’m not sure it’s the groundbreaking film the kudos suggest. Perhaps what
surprised me the most, given the director’s previous work, is how classical in structure and direct in manner it is.
I say that because McQueen’s great strength seems to be creating
atmosphere and resonance that reverberates from the interior, close-quarter
emotions of his protagonists (is it a nod to his reputation that the film
begins with a Shame–summoning attempt at
sexual congress?) And that element is consistently the strongest feature of 12 Years, as embodied by Chiwetel
Ejiofor’s Solomon Northup. Solomon is a man whose reality is upturned, and
whose grip on his own humanity is gradually eroded by continued exposure to his
masters’ lack of the same. Early on in his captivity he pronounces “I don’t want to survive. I want to live”
but it is exactly survival at which he becomes proficient, and it chips way at him.
John Ridley adapted Solomon Northup’s 1853 memoir of the
same name, in which Northup related his experiences as a free black tricked and
sold into slavery in 1841. He was transported from Washington to New Orleans
where he encountered a succession of owners of varying degrees of brutality,
either directly or indirectly.
Trader Theophilus Freeman (Paul Giamatti) sells him to
William Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch), the owner of a plantation. Ford, who bears
a kinder disposition than most of the whites he will encounter, favours Solomon.
But he is an exception even in his own household. We see that his wife (Liza J Bennett) lacks
his feeling, walking by unfazed as Solomon hangs from a noose on the
brink of expiration. When Solomon first arrives at the plantation, she numbly tells the
grieving Eliza (Adepero Odoye) to get some food and rest; her children “will soon be forgotten”.
Ford’s
attitudes are a primer to the sickness of a society built on the possession and
exploitation of fellow human beings. It is simply not possible to remain
untainted; even if one does not favour mistreatment, tacit support of the
status quo inevitably corrupts. When Solomon finally pleads with Ford to help
him, explaining his true status, Ford shuts his ears. Solomon’s past is a
threat to the bedrock of the South, and any complicity from Ford would endanger
his own well-being. Ford is unable to recognise the injustice of slavery. And
if all else fails in justifying one’s actions, simple economics is sufficient;
he has a debt he must pay. It’s this sliding scale of inhumanity that, in time,
will also inveigle Solomon.
But, during the early stages of the film, it is easier to
see lines. Ford is relatively well meaning, whereas Tibeats (Paul Dano, exuding
an air of inbred weaselry to outdo even his own impressive screen record), a
carpenter working on the plantation, relishes the cruelty and debasement he can
inflict.
Once Solomon is sold to Edwin
Epps (Michael Fassbender), McQueen and Ridley allow greater complexity to
surface. Epps routinely beats those slaves who fail to fulfil their daily
cotton-picking quota and sermonises at them with “proof” of their scripturally
endorsed inferiority. Yet he is also a man who betrays a mass of conflicts. Frequently
drunk and debauched, he earns the enmity of his disgusted wife (Sarah Paulson) as
he attends to his lust for female slave Patsey (Lupita Nyong’o). Epps regularly
rapes Patsey, and is seized by an uncontrollable obsession with her. If Epps
sounds irredeemable, he is. But unlike Tibeats, he is imbued with surprising
depth, which serves to make him more than a simple moustache-twirling movie villain. With Epps, McQueen
overcomes the impulse to indulge in the snarling caricature of Spielberg’s
Amon Goeth; he affords his monsters the understanding that they sorely lack in
respect of others.
Another layer is seen in Armsby (Gareth Dilllahunt), the
former slave overseer reduced to labouring in the fields as a consequence of
his drink habit. Armsby says all the right things, and it’s entirely
understandable that Solomon should be seduced into asking for his help. Armsby
claims he turned to drink to block out the truth of the evils he inflicted on
slaves, saying that the only other alternative would be to lie to oneself that such
behaviour was acceptable and warranted. Precisely why Armsby enacts such an about
face is unclear (it happens off screen; perhaps Solomon is correct in his
explanation) but he betrays Solomon and it is only through quick cunning that the
latter survives Epps’ interrogation. In a sense it feels like another
hoodwinking, the like of which lured Solomon to Washington and severe
misfortune.
And then there is Brad Pitt’s wonderfully enlightened
Canadian carpenter with an Amish beard, Bass. He arrives to provide Solomon
with hope when all seems lost. Echoing Ford's fears, it’s telling that even Bass, openly debating Epps’ distasteful dogma with him, has pause when Solomon requests that he deliver a message that might also endanger his, Bass’, life. I was amenable to Pitt’s performance in a way
some reviewers don’t appear to have been, but there is a cumulative feeling that 12 Years is only so far from becoming “Solomon’s’ encounters with a succession of white movie stars”.
By the pointBass arrives on the scene we have become more than accustomed to the pervading
fear of this world. There is a point early in his captivity with Epps where
Solomon runs away, or at least sets out to do so. Yet we desperately want him
to stay put, fearful of the punishment that awaits him if (when) he gets caught. His
advance through the shrub, only to happen across a lynch mob, serves to
reconfirm that the only course of action is to keep your head down and be
compliant. Likewise, we question his infrequent decisions to reveal his
background to those he hopes will understand or care. He has been told at the
outset that his learning will result in certain death if he tells his
masters. And this warning is reiterated during the course of the film.
McQueen’s achievement is that he ensures we too want Solomon only to
survive, not to live.
As I implied above, it’s curious to observe how Solomon’s
world is continually positioned in contrast to the white masters he meets.
Which is to say, they are the characters whom McQueen chooses to define Northup
by, rather than his mostly anonymous fellow slaves (with the exception of
Patsey).
McQueen was surely aware of this. One might be cynical of the
star quotient cachet, by which such performers punctuate the plot with purple
pirouettes. But it is also the case that the monstrous distortions in
their moral complexion, the absence of essential empathy, demonstrates
this environment as much as the suffering. The slave who advises Solomon to
keep schtum doesn’t even look back at him, as Northup desperately calls his name,
when his master retrieves him. There is no greater good to look towards; if one
is seen only as an object there is only self-preservation.
Over the fullness of time, Solomon’s leaking sense of self is close to reaching the same place of rejection. When he too is rescued, he turns back to bid the
distraught Patsey farewell. And then he leaves forever. He doesn’t make the same choice as his
predecessor, but he also takes the relief waiting for him. It is particularly potent that Patsey, who
begs him to kill her and end this continued abuse, should be
subjected to the film’s most horrific sustained beating at the reluctant Solomon’s
hands (and then those of Epps). When she asks him to end her life, Solomon
rebukes her (the sin would earn him eternal damnation), but in the moment where
he is reduced to whipping her he afflicts his soul in a much more profound manner
(Epps' threat to begin killing slaves if Solomon refuses seems like a rather
extreme ante-upper; it would make no financial sense for Epps to make good on
that, no matter how agitated he was). Instead of killing Patsey, Solomon “merely”
brutalises her. Another striking scene
of loss follows soon after, in which the usually stoic Solomon emotionally
collapses as he joins in with the Negro spiritual songs that announce the slave
experience; it is an expression of despair, desperation and release. This may
be the explanation for his limited interaction with his fellow slaves. Solomon doesn’t see them as his fellows; he’s not really a slave.
Whether or not that is the case, there’s often a tangential, on the outside
looking-in, quality to this experience. Solomon wasn’t a slave and then he was,
and he spends his most sustained interactions with his owners. As astonishing
and moving as Nyong’o’s performance is, hers is not a fully rounded character;
Patsey is there as the brunt of mutilation and torture. We get to know her
abuser so much better.
The ability to justify slavery occasionally becomes a
slightly rote tail wagging the narrative dog. McQueen has little need to preach;
the horror of a flagellation speaks a thousand words (and in due deference to
him, McQueen knows to use the beatings sparingly so as to yield maximum impact
and not lose his audience through a relentless assault). Still, the Pitt scene
comes perilously close to spoon-feeding an audience that should know better;
having superstar Brad deliver such wisdom feels distractingly calculated. In
contrast, while the ever-looming spectre of religion as the backbone of slavery
may seem blatant (and this was not the perspective of Northup, a Christian) it
deserves calling out as a key means of endorsing and perpetuating the system.
In the final captions, we learn that Solomon become an
abolitionist, unsuccessfully attempting to prosecute his captors. The nature of
his demise is stated as unknown; while this suggest murky goings-on, it appears
the simple truth is that no one knows his fate for sure. But this absence
highlights that there are other aspects of Solomon’s life where we are
left uncertain. The early scenes of freedom (and flashbacks, accompanied by an
idyllically-hued Hans Zimmer score – Zimmer is never one to go for the subtle) won’t
really be drawn on Solomon’s perspective on his daily life. He was fortunate enough
to be surrounded by appreciative white friends, but was he living a life of respectfully
not rocking the boat? The scene in the New York shop, where a slave intrudes
and his master fetches him back, suggests much; the apologetic master, who
blanches when Solomon tells him there is nothing to apologise for.
Where 12 Years
doesn’t quite pay off is in the formal limitations presented by a tight linear
narrative. McQueen seems to be pushing at these restraints constantly, never
quite at ease with them. Indeed, the structure of the story is so approachable you
could imagine Spielberg getting behind it for another Oscar bid (he would no doubt do
his best, never quite smart enough to breathe understanding into each frame as
McQueen can and layering the emotional beats with treacle). The episodic design is perhaps not McQueen’s best fit. And it’s odd
that, for a film whose very title lays the groundwork of its span, you’d be
hard-pressed to gauge the passage of time. The only real signal is the flecks
of grey in Solomon’s hair (and Patsey’s child with Epps). There is no sense of passing
years, or his time with either of his owners; I wouldn’t have realised he spent
almost 10 years with Epps.
That may be because McQueen’ presents his characters in the
moment. Part of this is down to the meditative visual tone he strikes. There is a
constant contradiction between the close-up beauty of the natural world and
the horror and ugliness of Solomon’s life. I was put in mind slightly of the
sensibility Malick brought to The Thin Red
Line, in which the devastation of war is in sharp contrast to the
environment on which it intrudes. Unlike Malick, McQueen doesn’t need a
voiceover to express Solomon’s inner world. Ejiofor ‘s deep, pained eyes
translate his every thought. His might be the performance of the year, so much
so that it towers over the tale itself.
It scarcely matters whether 12 Years a Slave takes the Best Picture Oscar in March. I suspect,
if it does, it will be seen as a vague anti-climax; the reverential reportage
would surely write itself. It wouldn’t be exciting or surprising enough,
because they always give the Oscar to issues based-dramas; don’t they? Perhaps
the main thing counting against it is that it is in essence, a very traditional
picture (coming from a 160 year old book, that probably shouldn’t be all that surprising).
Where McQueen succeeds most is with character, rather than his story. So if I
were to put money on anyone here, it would be Chiwetel (and Lupita) winning.
****
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