Absolutely Amazing

Rating: 10/10 (4 January 2016)

Solomon Northup, a well off, free and intelligent black man finds himself being kidnapped and sold into slavery. This movie not only explicitly takes you into the 1840s, it brings you to follow around the inhumanity of slavery itself. While watching, although I wanted so badly to look away and cry it completely keeps you attached to the screen and makes you feel uncomfortable every step of the way; I had expected a movie that would have been full on Hollywood romanticized, however this was not the case. Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Solomon Northup, and I think that he was the perfect person to do so. As a black actor, playing this part would seem to be unimaginably difficult (emotionally). He must put himself in the position that many of his people have faced, communicate with body language and sheer expressions to show his suppressed emotions as a slave with no rights, no humanity.
Moreover, I found this movie to be so incredible not only because of the reality but the accuracy. It not only almost identically followed the true accounts of Solomon Northup himself, but included all other historical accuracies of the 1800s. The way slavery is portrayed in the movie truly shows how vile and grim it was. It unsettles you, it makes you feel sick, but as a viewer it is impossible for you to look away. After watching, you feel as though you have seen a true form of our history and it only brings it to a bigger reality. This movie allows viewers to be educated of the true happenings without anything being sugarcoated. It brings history books to a swallow-able image.
Not only are the actors amazing, but the camera work as well. There is a scene in the movie, Solomon is about to be hung by Tibeats (the perfect image for white supremacy, minus the wealth, but he truly is scum). After he is saved from being hung, he stays barely touching the ground, rope around his neck. The camera stays on Solomon for about a good few minutes. This doesn't seem like a huge deal, but it wholeheartedly weighs you down just watching. He is hanging there, people on the plantation walking around him in the background, no sounds, no one doing a thing. This is only one scene that accurately displays how low, how dehumanized black slaves were seen during this time. I truly believe that out of anything I have seen or read of slavery, this scene and others from the movie made me REALLY realize that it had happened. In all of its atrocities. We, as white Americans, committed these things. We shouldn't forget about it.