Steve McQueen 2013 USA
Starring: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Lupita Nyong'o, Brad Pitt, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Dano, Sarah Paulson, Paul Giamatti, Adepero Oduye
When the nominations for the BAFTA's were announced earlier this year my father was quite excited at the inclusion of Steve McQueen and it took me several minutes and two Wikipedia pages to convince him that the action star had actually been dead for 33 years. This Steve McQueen is a Turner Prize winning artist who moved to directing features in 2008 and has since made three fearlessly intense, dazzlingly shot films in conjunction with the actor Michael Fassbender. 12 Years A Slave also has extraordinary camera work, taking in slick POV-style shots moving through a field of cane plants like an unseen animal, others showing the innards of motors and rotaries, at once malevolent and passive, and another focussing on the flaming ashes of a burnt letter, the only light on a darkened night. At the top of the pile though is a horrifyingly languid scene where Ejiofor's Solomon is hung from a tree with his feet just allowed to touch the ground so he doesn't die but nearly chokes with every breath. What makes things even worse is that, in long shot, the other slaves continue with their work knowing that it would be more than their lives worth to interfere. There are a lot of differences from McQueen's other work too, not least that this time Fassbender's isn't the most troubling character. There's no doubt that his disturbed, psychopathic, Old Testament raw nerve Edwin Epps is utterly terrifying, exuding threat even in his lucid moments, but somehow Benedict Cumberbatch's benevolent preacher Ford is worse. It's not that he's evil or even particularly unkind, it's that despite his beliefs and his obvious kindness he still actively owns slaves and, early in the film, separates a pleading mother from her children - his wife's mind-boggling response to which is "Something to eat and a little rest and those children will soon be forgotten". Whereas Epps genuinely thinks it is his God-given right to own, beat and control slaves and, in one scene, even leans on a child as if it were a fencepost Ford apparently has the enlightenment to see that his actions are wrong and the means to opt out of the entire practice but chooses not to. It's just one of a collection of complex characters, from Paul Dano's flailing, contemptuous rodent Tibeats to Alfre Woodard's former slave who, after marrying one of Epps' right-hand men, now lives alongside the masters to Paul Giamatti's repellent, fast-talking (and ironically named) trader Theophilus Freeman to Brad Pitt's liberal carpenter Bass. All are beautifully played, as is Lupita Nyong'o's Patsey, a debut performance that almost steals the film in its mixture of ferocity and passivity. But overall this is Ejiofor's film, he's present in every scene carrying with him a constant look of disbelief and, in the film's closing scene, is so frighteningly emotional it's harder to watch than any of the violence we've already witnessed. I don't think it's an exaggeration to call this Ejiofor's best performance and also McQueen's best film, an expert rendering of sin and human cruelty that both bodes well for their future work and leaves the viewer with the slightly deflating sensation that they may never better it.
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