It felt like one month of whipping

Rating: 6/10 (30 January 2014)

This movie is about a man who was kidnapped into slavery for 12 years, yet you don't really feel the 12 years, it felt like everything happened in one time frame of a month or so.
a perfect movie should take the audience into an emotional journey of happiness, sadness, laughter, awkwardness...etc. Steve McQueen the director did not succeed, in my opinion, to take us into this journey with him. it was sad all the time and depressing.
I understand he wanted to stay true to the story, but this movie was too true, almost like reading a diary from the 18th century. I think an Oscar nominee director should find a way to make a one dimensional story more interesting, because one thing for sure, I was bored a lot. the whole focus on the movie was on the "slaves" being whipped and why. it was all about random situations which caused the mean "master" to whip the "slaves".there was no focus on other aspects of this horrible 12 years. (**SPOILER ALERT** like for example, in the scene where Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor) was finally rescued, Patsey (Lupita Nyong'o) came and hugged him so tight and he hugged her too. I asked my self but why!! when did they become good friends!! did i miss something!! he even whipped her and refused to help her - when she asked him to kill her in an act of mercy- by turning his back on her (literally) and did not even calm her down or talk to her. so when did this friendship happen!! this is only one example of how this movie was one dimensional and only focused on whipping).
This movie is not a bad movie for sure, but i think it had so much potential and the director did not take advantage. and i think it was over-rated.
on the bright side, I liked how the characters were diverse, good white people and bad ones. also the songs they were singing as a group added a little bit of a fun flavor to the movie.