re: 12 Years a Slave - Tomatometer: 101 Reviews, 96% Positive

Is Freauxzen going to have a meltdown when he sees the reviews?

I usually trust Peter Travers' reviews. Love what he had to say about it:

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You won't be able to tuck this powder keg in the corner of your mind and forget it. What we have here is a blistering, brilliant, straight-up classic.

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Looks great, as long as it isn't preachy

total ripoff of life. Life is better.

Hey...

Django Unchained was a great movie.

Then again..the brilliance of that....The most evil character was a black man.

Anyone seen it yet? It's not showing anywhere in north Louisiana, and it's really pissing me off!

ETA: Neither is All Is Lost.

From a poster whose opinion I trust

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Well the movie just received a standing ovation. I’ve never experienced that before. Chiwetel Ejiofor gives an outstanding performance as Solomon Northup, while Ejiofor certainly has his moments to shine, it’s the moments in which McQueen just leaves the camera on Ejiofor without saying a single word, allowing his emotion and facial expressions to do the talking that really play at the heart strings. At points you could hear a pin drop apart from the sniffles of tears in the audience. Seriously Chiwetel Ejiofor is one of the best natural criers I’ve seen on screen, weird statement but its true.

Michael Fassbender has a lot of fun and really stinks his teeth into the role of Edwin Epps. A more violent Calvin Candle, there are moments when Fassbender looks lost within the role, in a good way. His eyes literally show no emotion or remorse for his actions. Lupita Nyongo’s really sold the emotion of her character and I understand why she is receiving the praise she has, especially in her latter scenes. Brad Pitt feels wasted and out of place, with only two short scenes. Benedict Cumberbatch plays the opposite to Michael Fassbender’s character, a slave owner who has his slaves best interest at heart. While Benedict did fine in his short role, again he felt a bit wasted.

The direction was what you’ve come to expect from Steve McQueen. He is great at building tension through natural sound and breathing like he did in Shame. The lashing scenes are pretty brutal, especially the last one where I swear I literally saw some flesh fly off the body. McQueen makes it even more brutal with long takes in which you never know if they are going to end. Zimmer’s score reminded me a lot of “Time” from Inception and felt quite repetitive. The Cinematography was beautifully shot, especially the cotton field and a sequence with the boat’s motor going through the water (I’m not sure what their actually called).

I wasn’t impressed with the editing I must admit. The pacing didn’t feel right in some places and the ending felt a bit abrupt. Overall I preferred Gravity and Inside Llewyn Davis but 12 Years a Slave is still a fantastic movie which I’m sure will sweep the Oscars.

Any questions feel free to ask?

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I really want to see this but I'm sure it's going to be intense.

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That's the one thing that gives me pause about seeing it. I'm not crazy about films that are over the top intense. I've never seen The Passion of the Christ because I didn't really feel like sitting and watching someone getting beat up for most of a movie. I kind of feel the same way about this.

I guess I need to read little more about what exactly the movie encompass. But if it's just an hour and a half or two hours of someone getting beat and whipped, I may pass on it.

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Is Freauxzen going to have a meltdown when he sees the reviews?

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Why would I have a meltdown? This looks like a super good film and I'm a big fan of Ejiofor.

One thing I like to mention in these threads is the book (and by extension the movie) has an LSU connection.

There was a widow in Northup's area who owned a plantation, and he had a lot of good things to say about her. In the 1960s, two of her great-granddaughters found the book in LSU's archives and worked to get it re-published.