Needs to be seen

Rating: 9/10 (25 March 2014)

"12 Years a Slave" follows Solomon Northup, a free black man at the middle of the 18th century in New York, who is kidnapped and sold as a slave and transported to the southern states. For the next 12 years he works in the fields, while slowly losing hope that he will ever regain his freedom. Chiwetel Ejiofor delivers a beautiful performance as Solomon, but is completely upstaged by the debuting Kenyan actress Lupita Nyong'o, playing the very unfortunate Patsey who suffers under constant abuse from the farm owner Edwin Epps, played by Michael Fassbender. The slavery is a big part of the American history, yet popular movies about this subject can be counted on one hand. Therefore this story is an important one to be told, and the director does so very honestly and true to History. What could easily have turned out to be a classic sob story about the pitiable black slaves turns out to be the story of an internal fight of the main character against his own destiny. The movie is very naturalistic, and virtually nothing is left to the imagination of the viewer; the movie contains brutal beating scenes and subsequent shots of completely torn-up and destroyed bodies. The movie was scored by Nicholas Britell, and he added to the movie original African working chants and the sound of Solomon's violin, furthering the very authentic feel of the movie.
The ending, however, does leave some to be desired. The writing is beautiful and fantastically simple (especially the line "I apologize for my appearance. But I have had a difficult time these past several years" is absolutely genius), and the entire situation is heart-breaking, but it seems to clash with the rest of the movie, and it really bothers me that Solomon's family seemingly have been sitting at home waiting for him for 12 years. The movie is about telling the story of the lives of slaves, and Solomon's family relations are secondary to the plot. Therefore it would have been cinematically a cleaner cut if the movie had ended with Solomon being on his way home. But the movie also has to appeal to the Hollywood audience who expect an emotional climax of the movie, so it is unfortunate, but not unexpected, to have such an over- emotional ending.
"12 Years a Slave" takes a lot of brain power to watch. It is full of extremely long, static cuts and excruciatingly raw cinematography. It is exceptionally realistic, heart-wrenching and definitely not for the squeamish. But it's also beautiful, awe-inspiring, tremendously well- written and very deserving of the Academy Awards it has won (Best writing for adapted screenplay, Best performance by leading actress to Lupita Nyong'o and Best Motion Picture). The movie tells an important story to be remembered by humanity, and it deserves and needs to be seen.