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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: 12 years a slave
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Taliesin
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# 14017
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Posted
I know film threads usually run in heaven, and/or I'm sorry if one already exists and I haven't spotted it, but I want to discuss this film with erstwhile shipmates.
I saw this film this evening, and it is grim. Relentlessly, unremittingly grim.
The slave trade was really truly and utterly terrible. Yes, it really was. Everyone who took part in it or turned a blind eye to it was equally culpable. The implications will go on reverberating for a hundred years or more.
But as a story, where is the heroism? Where is the spark of goodness we need to believe resides in dark places? I came out of the cinema with more empathy for Germans who failed to save Jews, because the overriding message seemed to be, do what you must to survive. That is all.
At the very end, in words on the screen, the later life, the outcome, of Solomon's life is mentioned. And as far as I can see, that should have been the material for two thirds of the film. A third terrible pointless suffering,a third trying to bring perpetrators to justice and finding the system sucked, and a third taking physical action by assisting escaping slaves on the railroad.
I feel I was coined by artful advertising, and it makes me not want to bother going to the cinema again, except to watch action films for the CGI.
thank God I didn't take my sons. They'd have been traumatised. There were people sobbing in the toilets, afterwards.
Not a fun evening out.
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
The slave trade was really truly and utterly terrible. Yes, it really was. Everyone who took part in it or turned a blind eye to it was equally culpable. The implications will go on reverberating for a hundred years or more.
<snip>
Not a fun evening out.
Have you considered that if you're looking for "fun", a film that realistically portrays what is notoriously one of the more brutal institutions of human history is probably not what you're looking for?
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
I haven't seen 12 years a slave, since I know enough about the time and place that a realistic story is not going to be a happy outing.
I skip a lot of Holocaust movies for the same reason. It's one thing to learn from a documentary, it's another to look for entertainment.
The usual complaint is that Hollywood movies usually put a happy ending on absolutely everything. Even if it's done skillfully, as in "Nebraska", it's a cloying optimism that insists that Everything Is For The Best. "Schindler's list" is a popular Hollywood movie; the Jews are all saved. "Saving Mr. Banks" is about how nice Mr. Disney rescued Mary Poppins from the gloomy grasp of the author.
There are happy tales, and valiant tales and tales of treachery and brutality. Are you arguing that the latter shouldn't be made into movies or must be turned into a happy affair?
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
I'm discussing a film that was sold as moving and inspirational. What I got was two hours of misery and tension. Would you like to discuss the film at all, or just criticise me for my opinion?
X posted with next person.
[ 30. January 2014, 23:01: Message edited by: Taliesin ]
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
To answer pamplist, I didn't like Schindlers list much, and didn't see the other two you mention. No,I hate unrealistic Hollywood treatment... but there is usually a point to a story somewhere... people tell stories to encourage and teach and warn and so on. In this film the only hero was the black man on the boat, who stands up for a woman, only to be stabbed and dumped overboard.
Solomon may keep his dignity, whatever that means, but he never takes action to help anyone, fails to offer comfort to a woman who begs him to kill her (a hug, even?) And never once uses his wonderful gift of music to bring any pleasure to his fellow slaves. Not a single melody.
And he tortures his friends when instructed to do so.
The film ends with him escaping, leaving behind, realistically, that same friend. But the story didn't end there, he took the kidnappers to court but failed to convict them, and he became active in helping runaway slaves to freedom. He died in murky circumstances.
I'm not so much saying films should be this or that, but exploring my own reaction to it and wondering what stories are for. Sometimes they are just sad. Maybe I would have felt a cathartic sense of something if I could identify with Solomon or Peggy, rather than the crap white people. Who were all either stupid, greedy, weak, evil or Batshit crazy.
[ 30. January 2014, 23:22: Message edited by: Taliesin ]
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
I haven't seen the film yet, but I plan to go next month. The topic is of personal interest to me. Hearing the good first reports of the film was enough; I haven't read enough reviews to be misled by expectations of being 'inspired'.
What we know is that the film is based on a true story, and that the writer was one of only a minuscule number of the millions of slaves in the Americas who lived to put their story on paper. Perhaps this is where the inspiration lies.
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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lilBuddha
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# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
I'm not so much saying films should be this or that, but exploring my own reaction to it and wondering what stories are for.
Perhaps so that we do not forget. That we do not live in the fiction that we would be heroes, that we would necessarily do good rather than just survive.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
I'm discussing a film that was sold as moving and inspirational. What I got was two hours of misery and tension.
I would argue that's a problem with the advertising, not with the film.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
I've heard 12 Years a Slave described as the progressive version of The Passion of the Christ. Seems like the same arguments pro and con can be made for both films. Don't know for sure. I haven't seen 12 Years a Slave. I live in podunk so I'll be waiting awhile.
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
I was hoping to get some thoughts from people who have seen it, but thanks everyone, anyway.
I hope I haven't spoiled it for anyone who is planning on going.
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
I'm not so much saying films should be this or that, but exploring my own reaction to it and wondering what stories are for.
Perhaps so that we do not forget. That we do not live in the fiction that we would be heroes, that we would necessarily do good rather than just survive.
But who is it meant to speak to?
Who is going to walk out of a cinema saying, oh my god,I thought slavery was ok sometimes!
Yes it was a fault of the advertising, but I'm trying to get beyond that now and understand who enjoys that kind of film at all. Or is 'enjoy' just a stupid expectation on any level? My 16 year old son has been told the film is 'brilliant' and planned to watch it on DVD. I'll advise him not to. He can't possibly learn anything from it.
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Palimpsest
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# 16772
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Posted
This may be U.S. centric, but there's still a nostalgia for the old South as exemplified in "Gone With The Wind" and arguments about whether state flags should include the Confederate flag as part of "heritage". So there's still people arguing that yes, slavery is bad, but it had a good side.
That aside, a historical view that shows unvarnished evil is useful to make one think about how you might deal with a situation that compromises your integrity. It's all too easy to identify with the white hats of history.
That said, without having seen the film I can say that helping fugitive slaves was a high risk affair since in many places the law was in the service of those trying to hunt down the runaways.
It's also hard to see a happy ending when one individual's misery is about to be followed by the misery of a conflict that escalates into a total war.
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
My 16 year old son has been told the film is 'brilliant' and planned to watch it on DVD. I'll advise him not to. He can't possibly learn anything from it.
When I was a teenager we were taken to the imperial war museum and saw footage of the liberation of Belsen. It wasn't enjoyable but it was important. As a child, a teacher also read us eye witness accounts of the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing. Again, it was not enjoyable but it was important.
There are thousands of people living in slavery today, and political and lifestyle choices you and your son make, will have an impact on that. (As everybody's do.). Perhaps it is important to see the unvarnished brutality at least once, even if the exact context has changed.
It can be not so very different nowadays.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Palimpsest:
That aside, a historical view that shows unvarnished evil is useful to make one think about how you might deal with a situation that compromises your integrity. It's all too easy to identify with the white hats of history.
I haven't seen this yet-- very much want to-- but the discussion reminds me of another controversial film, "The Grey Zone." It is about the ill fated prisoner rebellion at Auswitch, and centers around the Sonderkommand, a group of prisoners that are given a better standard of living and privileges in exchange for overseeing crematoria operations. The sub-officers do incredibly dirty work for their captors while secretly using their position to gather the resources for the bombing of the crematory.
There is one scene that happens that is recounted in a couple Holocaust survivor narratives, so it apparently happened-- a Sonder Komandant (played by David Arquette in the film) is supervising prisoners who are getting ready for the showers, and he spies an older man taking off a very expensive watch. He demands the man hand it over, and when the man refuses, kicks the man to death.
I don't know what basis this next has in reality, but director Tim Blake Nelson speculates that the guard's motives center around the possibility of trading the watch for munitions they are gathering for the revolt. He even seems to be trying to drop his voice and reason with the man, who is too angry and disoriented to catch on. When the man is dead, Arquette sits down with the coveted watch in his hand, and the shattered expression on his face sums it up-- here is a man who has crossed the line from fighting evil to resembling it.
The scene is brutal and heartbreaking.The entire movie is depressing beyond words. Yet, I feel it is one of the most important movies I have ever seen. Every minute of it was torture, yet it changed the way I looked at things. The story of a rich German buying Jewish freedom is inspiring and rewarding, but "The Grey Zone" really made me think, "Shit, that could be me. Or anybody."
I guess it comes down to whether or not you think film is primarily a way to entertain folkl or whether it might be a way to tell stories that would otherwise go untold. If I were not a Guillermo del Toro fan, I probably would not know a thing about Franco Spain and the ways people resisted his rule. If I wasn't a Mike Leigh fan, the poverty and unemployment in Northern England would not be something on my radar. If I hadn't seen "Innocent Voices", the idea of child soldiers would have been distant and academic to me.If I hadn't sat through difficult movies like "The Hurt Locker" and "In the Valley of Elah", I still might want the troops to come home, but not as desperately.
Art serves the dual function of entertaining and informing. It's OK to have movies with satisfying storylines, but it is also very important to respect those filmmakers who take the idea of sharing stories seriously. Society will never evolve if we restrict ourselves to stories that keep us comfortable.
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
You are very right about telling untold stories, it is vital. Soldier blue is apparently a true and vivid account of the native Americans, marched about Dakota til they died.
I may watch it one day, on the tv, on my own.
I definitely take the point that some people defend slavery, and have romantic notions... sadly I don't think many of them would watch this film.
My kids and I watch documentaries, of course.
And read books and newspapers. S1 knows more about world situations eg Korea, than I do, because he trawls the web for information.
My husband and I were celebrating yesterday because he sent off his OU assignment and I sent off my tax return and we'd decided a trip to the cinema was a reward, and we'd seen trailers for this powerful, moving film, and we said, let's go....
Also, I feel that the guy is unfairly taken at his word. If you survived when others didn't, you'd feel shit, hey? I wouldn't be glorifying myself with small details of personal bravery and goodness, when I rode away and left my friends.
So maybe he did, and was, but didn't include it in his 1857 memoir. So it feels unfair to dramatize, and yet give him no heroic dimension at all. Maybe.
I'm still trying to get to grips with something here.
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seekingsister
Shipmate
# 17707
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
I'm discussing a film that was sold as moving and inspirational. What I got was two hours of misery and tension. Would you like to discuss the film at all, or just criticise me for my opinion?
X posted with next person.
I haven't seen the movie yet but the reviews certainly do not suggest a moving and inspirational story.
Rotten Tomatoes - 12 Years A Slave
"a difficult movie to watch"
"In its portrayal of violence and spectatorship, it stays in the mind."
"Involving and disturbing"
" pit-of-the-stomach venturing, queasy-making drama"
"There's little doubt that this painfully authentic adaptation of former slave Solomon Northup's memoir is an important film. But it is not an easy one to sit through."
Posts: 1371 | From: London | Registered: May 2013
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
Yes. I'll read reviews in future.
We hardly ever go out...
ETA my husband felt it was a good film and was glad he watched it. I would have quietly left after the first half hour, otherwise.
Years ago I went to see pulp fiction at the cinema, I'd never heard of Quentin Tarantino, had no idea of content but had heard it was a brilliant film.
I walked out of that after 20 minutes.
I'm not comparing the two!
Just observing that one person's brilliant film is another person's ... not.
[ 31. January 2014, 08:36: Message edited by: Taliesin ]
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Barnabas62
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# 9110
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Posted
Not sure about this issue. There is a value in focusing on things which are "good and lovely". These is a value in having one's eyes open to uncomfortable truths. Drama can play a part in both. Might seem banal, but I caught a rerun of an ancient "Little House on the Prairie" episode very recently which portrayed both, and without sentimental overflow. Found it uplifting; not something I would always have said about that series, which often seemed to romanticise pioneer life.
I get very similar vibes from "Les Miserables".
Stories can picture redemption in very helpful ways. But I guess you can't ever be sure whether they will, or you are just being got at. Unless you try.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
An afterthought. These factors are in play, whether we are watching, or reading, fact , faction, fiction or fantasy. Happy endings, fulfilment are not guaranteed.
Reminds me of some powerful comments by Aldous Huxley about the tragic ending of "Brave New World" the dystopian future in which everyone was taught by "hypnotic techniques" that everyone's happy now, and if they weren't a drug induced holiday was freely available. A new arrival, with more profound values, tries to change it, tries to integrate with it, finds he cannot do either, commits suicide. Huxley regarded the ending as very fitting. I agree.
People come a cropper in our present dystopian cultures, and do not always find anything redemptive in that. That is no more the complete picture than the notion that people will always have that opportunity in this life. But drama is not meant to reflect everything, just illustrate something.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
I definitely take the point that some people defend slavery, and have romantic notions... sadly I don't think many of them would watch this film.
I'm not sure films like this are meant reach those who believe "The South will rise again", those who fondly reminisce of days of Empire or think the Holocaust an exaggeration. They are meant for those who might listen to them. For those who ignore these things happening now.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
My 16 year old son has been told the film is 'brilliant' and planned to watch it on DVD. I'll advise him not to. He can't possibly learn anything from it.
I would advise him to watch it. I think you are suffering from mismatched expectations. Had you been prepared to see a disturbing portrayal of the horrors of slavery you might feel differently.
But I suggest you are learning something about your reaction to suffering, a need to see something redemptive coming out of suffering to make sense of it, then facing the fact that much of slavery was like this - suffering without redemption and with no heroic victory. There is lots to learn and reflect on here.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
My 16 year old son has been told the film is 'brilliant' and planned to watch it on DVD. I'll advise him not to. He can't possibly learn anything from it.
The film is based on the book Northup wrote after regaining his freedom. So that's why it ends where it ends - where Northup himself ended it.
I think what someone could learn from it is the difficulties of surviving in a morally compromised setting. Things aren't black and white. Ford, according to Northup's book, was one of the best, morally good, people he'd ever met; but he was fatally compromised by owning slaves. Northup himself has to make bad choices because he doesn't have any good ones. (Brad Pitt's character, who is the closest to an uncompromised person there is in the film, on the other hand is a bit dull.)
Certainly if you want inspiration and heroism go and see Gravity. This isn't that film. (But it's not Four Months, Three Weeks, and Two Days either.)
The scenery is beautiful.
I think it's a brilliant film, thought-provoking, and Ejiofor is a great actor.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
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Angloid
Shipmate
# 159
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
But I suggest you are learning something about your reaction to suffering, a need to see something redemptive coming out of suffering to make sense of it, then facing the fact that much of slavery was like this - suffering without redemption and with no heroic victory. There is lots to learn and reflect on here.
I agree.
I've never seen any other film, however grim or gruelling the subject matter, that included no light relief whatsoever. No humour, no 'love interest' (in the Hollywood sense anyway: Solomon clearly loved his wife and family very dearly), not even any relief from the almost palpable oppressive heat of the Southern weather.
I came away saddened, horrified, feeling helpless. Although there was a sort-of happy ending for Solomon himself, his fellow-slaves continued to be ill-treated with no end in sight.
But isn't that exactly the sort of reaction we have on Good Friday after hearing (and entering into) the story of the Passion? It too is unremittingly bleak, and yet we need to hear it, without trivialising it (or Easter) into a 'happy ending'.
The resolution to the tragedy of slavery is still not fully realised. The worst thing would be if the film had suggested 'that was then: we know better now', when those same forces of evil are at work in many parts of the world. But the seeds of redemption were there in Solomon's refusal to be other than the self he knew.
It was beautifully filmed - Steve McQueen is very much the artist as well as the film director - and brilliantly acted, especially by Ejiofor.
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Brian: You're all individuals!
Crowd: We're all individuals!
Lone voice: I'm not!
Posts: 12927 | From: The Pool of Life | Registered: May 2001
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
My 16 year old son has been told the film is 'brilliant' and planned to watch it on DVD. I'll advise him not to. He can't possibly learn anything from it.
I find this comment a bit disturbing. As a 16 year old he almost certainly doesn't know everything there is to know about Transatlantic slavery, not unless you as a family have deliberately urged your children to study it at much as possible. So why would you say that there's nothing he could learn from this story?
Storytelling is important because it brings things to life. And if a film is based on any kind of serious topic, as this is, it might be an inspiration to further reflection and intellectual exploration. For a young person who's only just embarking on a serious engagement with life I don't know why this would be a bad thing.
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Amos
Shipmate
# 44
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Posted
Go ahead and advise him not to. If he's a sixteen year old worth his salt, that will hardly discourage him.
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At the end of the day we face our Maker alongside Jesus--ken
Posts: 7667 | From: Summerisle | Registered: May 2001
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Lilac
Shipmate
# 17979
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Posted
I've just been reading up on King Leopold II of Belgium and his activities in the Congo, featuring routine mutilations and an estimated 10 million dead. And that's almost been forgotten.
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Seeking...
Posts: 62 | From: Birmingham / Coventry Area, UK | Registered: Jan 2014
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seekingsister
Shipmate
# 17707
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lilac:
I've just been reading up on King Leopold II of Belgium and his activities in the Congo, featuring routine mutilations and an estimated 10 million dead. And that's almost been forgotten.
Well speaking of Chiwetel Ejiofor, I was lucky enough to see him in the play "A Season in the Congo" last summer in which he played Patrice Lumumba. Fantastic performance. The show touches on the brutality of Belgian imperialism which as you mention is a somewhat undiscussed piece of recent history.
The director of the play is a film director - Joe Wright, who did "Atonement" and the most recent "Pride and Prejudice." So there is the hope that this will become a film project. Given Ejiofor's rising status it will be an easier case to make now.
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Lilac
Shipmate
# 17979
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Posted
With King Leopold, the phrase "Lest we forget" comes to mind. When one of Hitler's associates queried his anti-Jewish policy, he retorted that it would soon be forgotten, just like the Turkish treatment of Armenians.
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Seeking...
Posts: 62 | From: Birmingham / Coventry Area, UK | Registered: Jan 2014
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
Years ago I went to see pulp fiction at the cinema, I'd never heard of Quentin Tarantino, had no idea of content but had heard it was a brilliant film.
I walked out of that after 20 minutes.
The end of Pulp Fiction is a truly uplifting glimpse of the possibility of redemption and grace.
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
But who is it meant to speak to?
Who is going to walk out of a cinema saying, oh my god,I thought slavery was ok sometimes!
I give you Richard Cohen, a supposedly well-educated columnist for the Washington Post.
quote:
I sometimes think I have spent years unlearning what I learned earlier in my life. For instance, it was not George A. Custer who was attacked at the Little Bighorn. It was Custer — in a bad career move — who attacked the Indians. Much more important, slavery was not a benign institution in which mostly benevolent whites owned innocent and grateful blacks. Slavery was a lifetime’s condemnation to an often violent hell in which people were deprived of life, liberty and, too often, their own children. Happiness could not be pursued after that.
Yes, apparently someone can have job for years at one of America's premier newspapers and suddenly be shocked by the revelation that chattel slavery was "not a benign institution".
The internet scorn was swift and well deserved.
quote:
Richard Cohen cannot believe he did not learn any of this in school. What Confederate redoubt in the ass end of Georgia or Alabama did he grow up in? Oh, nice job, Far Rockaway H.S.
So apparently there was at least one person who "walk[ed] out of a cinema saying, 'Oh my god, I thought slavery was ok sometimes!'"
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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IconiumBound
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# 754
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Posted
At my retirement community (65+)we recently watched the film with about 30 people attending. There were several who left before the end but most stayed. There was no group discussion but we do plan to talk about it in our on-going "conversations on race" forum.
I am always surprised by the "I never knew that" responses to this and other similar historic films and shows. In our mostly upper class environment I guess that the themes of oppression had been safely relegated to repressed memories.
An I am sure that this process of rationalization goes on today with our youth. So be sure they DO see "Twelve Years" and listen to what they saw.
Posts: 1318 | From: Philadelphia, PA, USA | Registered: Jul 2001
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Forthview
Shipmate
# 12376
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Posted
Solomon's actions or indeed lack of them are all with the one aim in mind -namely to return to his family - to explain to them what had happened,why he had simply disappeared.
Many of us on our way through life have to make choices which may not help everyone.Had Solomon helped anyone ,had he revealed anything more about himself,he would probably have been killed and that would not have helped his family.
Posts: 3444 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2007
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IconiumBound:
I am always surprised by the "I never knew that" responses to this and other similar historic films and shows. In our mostly upper class environment I guess that the themes of oppression had been safely relegated to repressed memories.
There's been a concerted effort to "pretty up" the historical realities of the Old South and its Peculiar Institution starting around the end of Reconstruction. This effort to suppress fact an spread fictions continues today. So this kind of ignorance isn't an accident, it's a measure of the success of a deliberate PR campaign over a century old.
[ 31. January 2014, 14:12: Message edited by: Crœsos ]
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Gwai
Shipmate
# 11076
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Posted
Thanks for the links. I for one am seriously shocked that people like Richard Cohen exist. Apparently I consistently underestimate the human ability for deception. (Maybe I'm deceiving myself about it!)
To be fair, I this relates directly to a form of deception I have seen myself. I accidentally made some people at my school mad after 9-11. (Small liberal arts college, so relatively educated middle or upper class people) They kept saying things like "They [People in certain Arabic countries] really hate us." They were so shocked. It seriously shook their whole realities. If they'd been sad because people were dead, I would totally have gotten it. But what shook their lives was that people hated Americans. Every single time people said that to me in their super-shocked way I could never find an appropriate response, because my thoughts were always "No shit, Sherlock!" Despite every article about how angry American foreign policy makes people, they were still shocked that people were angry enough about it to kill. I think people often feel they can't handle that much pain (what are we doing to be so hated etc. Do I have to change?) so they instead imagine that the slaves were actually happy, no one is now in real slavery, and yes everyone really likes the U.S. They're just jealous.
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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.
Posts: 11914 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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Tubifex Maximus
Shipmate
# 4874
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lilac:
With King Leopold, the phrase "Lest we forget" comes to mind. When one of Hitler's associates queried his anti-Jewish policy, he retorted that it would soon be forgotten, just like the Turkish treatment of Armenians.
Yes, that's my view too. For the british there is still a tendency for us to believe that our empire was somehow built on Cricket, fair play and free trade. It was, of course, quite otherwise. I haven't seen the film yet but will; I want to expose myself to the dramatic horror of something I have learned about and understood as part of history lessons but too dispassionately.
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Sit down, Oh sit down, sit down next to me.
Posts: 400 | From: Manchester | Registered: Aug 2003
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SvitlanaV2
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# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
I accidentally made some people at my school mad after 9-11. (Small liberal arts college, so relatively educated middle or upper class people) They kept saying things like "They [People in certain Arabic countries] really hate us." They were so shocked. It seriously shook their whole realities. If they'd been sad because people were dead, I would totally have gotten it. But what shook their lives was that people hated Americans. Every single time people said that to me in their super-shocked way I could never find an appropriate response, because my thoughts were always "No shit, Sherlock!" Despite every article about how angry American foreign policy makes people, they were still shocked that people were angry enough about it to kill. I think people often feel they can't handle that much pain (what are we doing to be so hated etc. Do I have to change?) so they instead imagine that the slaves were actually happy, no one is now in real slavery, and yes everyone really likes the U.S. They're just jealous.
I've heard about Americans like this before - desperate to be loved. By contrast, the British (and specifically the English) seem much more aware of being disliked by various other nations around the world. But they're less likely to care. If they do care they're perhaps less naïve about what it'll take to change perceptions.
Regarding the slave trade, the subject commonly creates either defensiveness or a sense of shock in white commentators. The former response seems to be more likely on the internet, but that's only my impression. Fortunately, there are also people who respond to the issue with understanding and sensitivity.
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lilBuddha
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# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
Thanks for the links. I for one am seriously shocked that people like Richard Cohen exist.
I am shocked that people are shocked about people like Cohen. When Disney made Song of the South they knew it would be controversial and why. Its merits and demerits were argued in the press. Yet it, and Gone with the Wind inform many viewer's perception regardless.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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pete173
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# 4622
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Posted
We went to see it. I consider that it's epic. One of the best films I've seen in ages. Perhaps we have different expectations of films - I'm sure we do. It's not "entertainment" in the sanitised Hollywood way of understanding films (note to self - don't get stuck on the way US film-making usually alters history and feels compelled to produce a feel good factor). Perhaps Brits are more used to films being gritty, realist and tough viewing.
What 12 Years a Slave does is undermine the idea that there is anything romantic or salvageable from the US (and UK) slave trade. It tells it like it was. Even William Ford is shown to be a coward, unable to buck the economic system that was held together with slavery. You can't come out of the cinema with any romantic attachment to dear old Dixie. The South and what it embraced was unremittingly awful and the dehumanisation that occurred has huge parallels with the philosophy that undergirded the Holocaust. Black people were treated as economic instruments, not people.
There's a sense in which we needed 12YAS because of Gone with the Wind and all the other Uncle Tom niceties of the silver screen. Steve McQueen is a different sort of director - see his previous film, Hunger which was equally raw about the IRA hunger strikers.
Mark Kermode's show on McQueen is on BBC iPlayer here (probably only UK) and will help understanding of where McQueen is coming from.
I thought it was fantastic and should be used widely in educating people about slavery and its legacy.
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Pete
Posts: 1653 | From: Kilburn, London NW6 | Registered: Jun 2003
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Liopleurodon
Mighty sea creature
# 4836
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Posted
Yeah I've heard the argument that slavery wasn't all that bad on many occasions. "At least they were fed and clothed and given shelter. Most of them probably didn't even want to be free." Yadayada. There were lots of people making that argument during the time of slavery and it's really depressing that people still make that argument now but they definitely do.
I've not been to see this one because I knew that if it was inaccurate it'd annoy me and if it was accurate I'd find it harrowing rather than entertaining. But for what it's worth I'm glad that they didn't try and turn it into a story of redemption and hope. Not everything has to be a story of redemption and hope - I think we're far, far too used to the idea that the good guys always win in the end somehow.
Posts: 1921 | From: Lurking under the ship | Registered: Aug 2003
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Gwai
Shipmate
# 11076
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
Thanks for the links. I for one am seriously shocked that people like Richard Cohen exist.
I am shocked that people are shocked about people like Cohen. When Disney made Song of the South they knew it would be controversial and why. Its merits and demerits were argued in the press. Yet it, and Gone with the Wind inform many viewer's perception regardless.
Remember though that that was the 1940s. I guess I would like to think we are a little further along in consciousness of other people than we were then. I mean maybe we aren't, but I suspect that is why I personally can still be shocked.
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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.
Posts: 11914 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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seekingsister
Shipmate
# 17707
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by pete173:
Mark Kermode's show on McQueen is on BBC iPlayer here (probably only UK) and will help understanding of where McQueen is coming from.
I second a recommendation for this program. It definitely reveals his aesthetic. He certainly has no problem producing art that makes one feel extremely uncomfortable.
Posts: 1371 | From: London | Registered: May 2013
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ToujoursDan
Ship's prole
# 10578
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Posted
I saw it as well. There was audible sobbing in the theatre. My date and I were in stunned silence for about 20 minutes afterward. My reaction was very similar what I had after seeing Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ".
But ultimately I feel the same was Pete173 does. It was a brilliant film. I've traveled to many places where the slave trade was present (Zanzibar, Gorée Island in Senegal, plantations in Cuba and Jamaica, etc.) and have been haunted by the conditions and treatment these people endured.
This is one film that does what happened justice. I don't see it as a film with progressive or conservative values; it's just one that lays it out there.
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"Many people say I embarrass them with my humility" - Archbishop Peter Akinola
Facebook link: http://www.facebook.com/toujoursdan
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
It depends on what you go to see films for. I will absolutely not be seeing this one, as my daily life exposes me to enough horrors as it is. What I want and need is escapism, or at least some ray of hope. Others may need their comfort to be disturbed. That's okay too. I'll just stay home and nurse my PTSD. ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ToujoursDan:
I've traveled to many places where the slave trade was present (Zanzibar, Gorée Island in Senegal, plantations in Cuba and Jamaica, etc.) and have been haunted by the conditions and treatment these people endured.
Me too. I remember my wife just standing there sobbing when we visited Cape Coast Castle in Ghana.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Taliesin:
Also, I feel that the guy is unfairly taken at his word. If you survived when others didn't, you'd feel shit, hey? I wouldn't be glorifying myself with small details of personal bravery and goodness, when I rode away and left my friends.
I dunno, plenty of Holocaust narratives read like this. You regret what you couldn't do, but why not take comfort in what you could do?
And, I'm sorry, IMO the world hangs on small acts of personal bravery and goodness.
[ 31. January 2014, 20:14: Message edited by: Kelly Alves ]
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by pete173:
Perhaps Brits are more used to films being gritty, realist and tough viewing.
See Mike Leigh. I have to say, some of the bravest, most challenging films I have seen have come from UK directors. Although stepping anywhere outside of Blockbuster Hollywood helps.
(aside-- you should check out The Grey Zone.)
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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comet
Snowball in Hell
# 10353
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:
It wasn't enjoyable but it was important.
this.
I have not seen this film and when I do, I will approach it carefully. I do not take in theater and cinema just to have a good time, to "enjoy". I want to learn, to observe, to witness, to experience. I will likely never experience slavery (thanks be) but it is important that I know.
And those vicarious experiences transform you, if they're done right.
I will chose to see this movie in part because of the lead actor (who's name I will not attempt to remember how to spell). I believe he is one of the most outstanding actors in recent years. perhaps even the best. I expect his interpretation to be gritty; but I would expect no less.
Most of the theater I have done is under the "enjoyable" heading. comedies. silliness. "fun" stories. But the stuff I really love, what I long to do more of, is not "enjoyable".
the best role I've ever been given was in Agnes of God. This is a brilliant play. Beautifully written. and it kicks you right in the gut. I would not consider attending Agnes as a nice relaxing evening out. But those kind of shows are so important. We emerge transformed. We have experienced - vicariously - a real story and a real moment with real people* and just like with our own tragedies and traumas, we become more three dimensional through these experiences.
this kind of art transforms us. It creates depth, and empathy, and most of all, strength.
this is art at it's most intimate. and it is vital.
*"real" in this case applies to fictional characters and situations as well. as anyone who ever cried after reading Bridge to Terabithia can tell you, fiction can at times be more transformative than non-fiction. the "real" applies to the "gut" of a piece. Hell, to me, the Narnia books are very real.
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Evil Dragon Lady, Breaker of Men's Constitutions
"It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.” -Calvin
Posts: 17024 | From: halfway between Seduction and Peril | Registered: Sep 2005
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
Google has a new doodle honouring Harriet Tubman. One bad-ass woman.
This is a mention because it is related and in no way a comment on Solomon Northup.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
Comet, you're completely right in that it doesn't have to be enjoyable, as in fun.
But in Agnes of God, did she have faith? Did she do good things or hold to a principle ?
I suspect something beyond survival was going on.
I need to read the book, and see if I can understand what's going on in his head.
The lead actor was totally brilliant. Benedict cumerbach was a disappointment. Weak and pointless character.
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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Taliesin
Shipmate
# 14017
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Posted
In the book's introduction, Solomon specifically says he is writing an unexagerated account of his experiences, to counteract recent (contemporary) accounts of how slavery could be ok.
Suddenly the whole damn film makes more sense, and I wouldn't have chosen to see it on that night. I'd downloaded the book, only about 47p on kindle, but decided not to read it till I'd seen the film, as it usually annoys me when they leave so much out or twist things round. I should have read the intro, at least.
I wanted him to have faith... the whole film left God out, except as a stick white men used to beat slaves with, and a bit of folk religion from slaves. Where was God, when slavery was rife?
Where is God now, in places where slavery and similar cruelty goes unchecked?
Maybe that's why my husband liked it. People surviving without need of God.
[ 01. February 2014, 08:51: Message edited by: Taliesin ]
Posts: 2138 | From: South, UK | Registered: Aug 2008
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