NYFF AT 51 REVIEW: "12 YEARS A SLAVE"

BY MATEO MORENO

Powerful and moving, epic and masterful, the grand 12 YEARS A SLAVE is the most honest film I have ever seen about the American slave experience.  Directed with a unflinching touch by Steve McQueen, this epic true story follows Soloman Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a free Black man living in 1841 New York with his wife children.  A pair of white men offer him a job playing Violin at a Circus in Washington and he accepts.  Soon the trio are celebrating with a night out on the town and everything seems a bit too good to be true.  And it is.  Soloman wakes up the next morning shackled and enslaved.  He is no longer a free man.  He's been sold into slavery and will remain there for the next 12 years heading from master to master, some with feeling but most emitting utter cruelty.  None more so than slave owner Edwin Epps (Michael Fassbender) and his equally cruel wife (Sarah Paulson).  The hatred that spews from them is a dark and bending path, but as McQueen tells it, it's the most realistic path a slavery film has taken.  It doesn't hide in the cruelty and hurt of Northup's story.  Nor does it shy away from the breaking of another slave Patsey (Lupita Nyong'o in her acting debut), who Master Epps is actually having a cruel affair with.

Not only is McQueen's filmmaking a marvel here, the performances one after another are simply stunning.  As Soloman, Ejiofor radiates on screen, pulling you in with each and every breath.  His struggle seeps deep within you, and he will absolutely be rewarded with an Oscar nomination come due time.  Fassbender is sickening cruel, and his performance is full of destruction and power.  It's also layered with a man who's at odds with himself, fighting something within him and losing.  Nyong'o is perhaps one of the most impressive aspects of the film, as she draws you in with even the slightest movement she makes (The whipping scene between her and Solomon was so destructive and sad I had to look away).  Paulson's character is a true Lady MacBeth, conniving and evil.  She has no remorse in her bones and it's chilling.  I imagine this film will be hard for many to watch, as it doesn't flinch as most other films do.  But however violent and uncomfortable it may get, it's an engrossing and powerful film.  One you shouldn't see, but NEED to see.

MATEO'S GRADE: A Must See

Based on the Novel by Solomon Northup Adapted by John Ridley Directed by: Steve McQueen Starring Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Lupita Nyong'o, Sarah Paulson.

CONTENT ADVISORY: Adult Situations, Adult Language, Nudity, Graphic Violence

BOTTOM LINE: A truly extrodinary, breathtaking, and painful film.  A truthful look into our awful past, and as they say, we must be honest with our past before we can truly move forward.