This blog, is really meant to provide reviews after something has had a chance to live in our collective culture for a while. Because hindsight is 20/20. Even if the main subjects have only been around for a few weeks. It seems effective to think about, process, digest things we see, and contemplate their impact from different angles before deciding on it's place. So I don't usually like to discuss things I haven't seen. I don't like to ''predict'' if it will be a hit, or a miss. That sort of critique often goes against the rules of ''The Common Sense School of Review'' (rules, totally made up by me lol). However, writing this afterward didn't seem prudent. I anticipate that I will have too many things to say. Which is why I haven't written the ''Fruitvale Station'' review yet. But I will share a few thoughts of the initial offerings from the film.
I had heard of the Solomon Northup story years before now. I think something in my sub-conscious kept me from reading it. If the system of slavery wasn't horrible enough, the dehumanization of blacks in the collective common mind, made it so, not even a person who was legally ''free'' could safely remain so. Certain circumstances could yank them from relative security to the pit of hell that was the deep south. That's an rigged game if I've ever heard of one.
While viewing the trailer for the new film, directed by Steve McQueen (not the Bullitt/Thomas Crown McQueen the OTHER McQueen, with a slightly different melanin level), and starring Chiwitel Ejitfor, as Northup, I was struck by the epic language used in the promo spot. Amid scenes from the film, the narrator says something like ''to get back home, it'll take everything he has''...and it made me think of words I had heard before. Describing an unwitting hero, a person who may be a hero for their country, or their family, but also someone who must be a hero for themselves, despite insurmountable odds. That the whole premise being the story of the fictional film ''Gladiator'' with Russell Crowe, and Joaquin Phoenix.
Basically Russell is a general, minding his business, being about the business of the king. The king dies, under dubious circumstances, and though Crowe's character Maximus received the blessing of the king to run the kingdom in his stead, the horrid son of the king isn't having it. Maximus is exiled, his family is ripped from him, and he is sold into the bowels of Roman slavery, to become, a gladiator. As such, he must fight for his life in public matches against other gladiators and animals. In the end he must rise above the pain and suffering he is routinely subjected to, to help Rome. Northup, a talented violinist, is similarly removed from his family, and thrown in to the pit of american chattel slavery, and must fight the fight of his life, to escape it. Seems like the same sort of tale about the triumph of the human spirit to me. What makes the Northup story different from the Gladiator story, is that it's true. It came from the word and testament of Northup himself. And compared to the other slave narratives of that genre, it is said to feature more detail of the harrowing violence, and dehumanization practices on those in that system.
I did not want to see another ''slave movie''. I've seen them all, Roots, Glory, Django, and even some lessor known ones. Though I'm addicted to stories, I didn't want to see another movie about the gross injustice of the years of slavery, or the Jim Crow south (like Rosewood). For two reasons. The first being that, it seems Hollywood loves us best when we are thugs, derelicts or degenerates or tokens (magical and ordinary). In media we only seem to be triumphant when we are slaves, or perpetually stuck in the lynching years, or the civil rights movement. These stories are necessary, because so many people either don't know, don't care, or don't believe the sordid history of how people of color are treated worldwide, but also how this mistreatment, this disenfranchisement is built into the foundation of our nation. So I tend to support these films, though they bring a heavy melancholy cloud to my life, or fill me with anger. Sometimes though, I just want a RomCom, with some people who look like me. You know?
That said, I'm glad to see this film. It's gotten amazing reviews for being powerful as well as historically accurate following closely to the original story Northup told. So I would encourage everyone who can to see it at least once, and let it's messages sink in. Let the story of the true horrors of slavery but also the ability to rise above resonate. Because Northup was one of the lucky ones, so many didn't make it, and had to find their redemption, their salvation and their peace after death, if at all. This story, as well as others like it, should help to change our understanding of just how sinister chattel slavery was to those who were victim of it, living outside of it's immediate gates, and those who were owners of the system itself. Oppression doesn't just give obvious wounds to the oppressed, if cripples the oppressors, in ways they are often unaware of. Racism, classism, sexism, etc, are like Benefiber roofies. You put it in the water, and stir it up until it's visibly undetectable, but if you start passing it out at parties, or start pouring the mixture in the groundwater, everyone is gonna get the bubbleguts, and not know why. They may even come to believe it's a normal natural part of life (if I may abuse the hell out of a metaphor).
If we can understand these dark times, we may save ourselves from the banality of repeating them. Let's be better.
***Full disclosure, I never did watch the film. Because I wasn't ready, then Ferguson happened, and Eric Garner, and Tamir Rice, and #Pointergate, and most recently, the events in Madison, WI. *shrug* I still want to see the film, but I want to not be mad the next day.
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