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This film was one of the most powerful and emotion evoking movies I've ever seen. Easily the finest film this year has to offer. Finally got to see it this afternoon. Anybody else get the oppurtunity to witness this masterpiece?

I didn't know it existed until just now. I'll have to watch it.

.

Amazing movie

Such a powerful and well made movie.

Saw this film about a month ago now, and it's still lingers in my mind from time to time.

It was one of the most powerful and haunting films I've ever seen, and I believe it's the single best film I've seen in maybe 10 years.

Ejiofor, Fassbender, and Nyung'o all give performances for the ages. Fassbender in particular is memorable for me because I honestly felt his character was maybe the most loathsome and disgusting character ever put on screen. I actually felt sick just looking at him by the end of the film, and Nyung'o's character was just heartbreaking and soul shattering. The whipping scene near the end was one of the most painful and difficult scenes I've ever watched in a film.

And with this film McQueen showed that he's arguably the best director on the planet. His clarity of vision for this film was beyond impressive, and his use of imagery to convey various things, that lesser directors would have conveyed lazily via words, was just so damn impressive, and his trademark lingering camera was used to devastating effect.

Yeah, just an incredible and brilliant film. Shame not more people know about it yet. Guess it's only a matter of time, when this film is nominted for a shit load of awards more will go see it.

i need to see this

Originally posted by BackFire
Saw this film about a month ago now, and it's still lingers in my mind from time to time.

It was one of the most powerful and haunting films I've ever seen, and I believe it's the single best film I've seen in maybe 10 years.

Ejiofor, Fassbender, and Nyung'o all give performances for the ages. Fassbender in particular is memorable for me because I honestly felt his character was maybe the most loathsome and disgusting character ever put on screen. I actually felt sick just looking at him by the end of the film, and Nyung'o's character was just heartbreaking and soul shattering. The whipping scene near the end was one of the most painful and difficult scenes I've ever watched in a film.

And with this film McQueen showed that he's arguably the best director on the planet. His clarity of vision for this film was beyond impressive, and his use of imagery to convey various things, that lesser directors would have conveyed lazily via words, was just so damn impressive, and his trademark lingering camera was used to devastating effect.

Yeah, just an incredible and brilliant film. Shame not more people know about it yet. Guess it's only a matter of time, when this film is nominted for a shit load of awards more will go see it. Where do you think it ranks among the movies of the last couple years? Anything better than it to you?

Agree with you on his "lingering camera effect". Worked great in multiple areas. But do you really think his filmography warrants the label of best director on the planet?

I haven't seen Hunger yet but Shame wasn't great.

No, I can't think of a better film that was made in the last few years. No Country for Old Men might be the last one I saw that I felt was in the same league.

I thought Shame was quite good, Hunger, less good. But the jump in quality from Shame to 12 Years a Slave is pretty headspinning, I think.

And when I say this film shows that he's arguably the best director on the planet, I don't really mean in regards to his filmography. I just believe this film was an extraordinary achievement in filmmaking that shows just how hugely talented he is. One of the biggest issues with both Shame and Hunger was the emotional distance between the main character and the audience. With 12 Years a Slave that was erased, and to me it felt like McQueen really just clicked with his material this time and put more effort into telling a great story instead of really focusing purely on the images, which is what it felt like he was doing in Shame and Hunger.

I plan to see this ASAP. People are telling me things amazing.

I will be interested in hearing your thoughts once you see it, Imp. It's an outstanding film.

Originally posted by BackFire
No, I can't think of a better film that was made in the last few years. No Country for Old Men might be the last one I saw that I felt was in the same league.

I'm struggling trying to come up with something better recently.

Just came back from seeing it with my dad. As a black man, it was especially powerful and emotional to see. Solomon's journey was incredible and would have broken many many people.

I suggest it for anyone.

Wow, this sounds outstanding! Gonna catch it as early as I can.

Just caught a second viewing. Instant masterpiece. Honestly, one of the very best movies I've ever seen. I'm struggling to think of a better film in the last few years.

Munich, The Dark Knight, Inception, Inglourious Basterds, etc. I think this film MIGHT be better than all of them.

Seriously, everyone go support it. Ejiofor and Fassbender killed this movie.

Caught this last night, a very solid piece of film all around; highly recommend you catch this one on the big screen.

My only two real complaints and they're not huge ones:

-Pitt's accent wasn't very good, was hard to place since he was playing a Canadian who had lived in the US for decades, but it felt overly forced and took you out of the film.

-One actress's crying, again, felt forced and took you out of dismal surroundings and plight of the slaves/Solomon.

Backfire nailed it in regards to Fassbender's character, I haven't loved to hate a character this much since Phoenix played that patricidal, sister-****ing, murderous c**t Commodus.

Originally posted by Darth Martin
Just caught a second viewing. Instant masterpiece. Honestly, one of the very best movies I've ever seen. I'm struggling to think of a better film in the last few years.

Munich, The Dark Knight, Inception, Inglourious Basterds, etc. I think this film MIGHT be better than all of them.

Seriously, everyone go support it. Ejiofor and Fassbender killed this movie.

You know, I also saw it twice and it was one of those rare movies that I thought was better on the second viewing. The first viewing is more an emotional experience and so it's easy to kind of miss how technically impressive the film is, on the second viewing you can really appreciate all the talent involved. That's how I know it's an amazing movie, actually better on the second viewing, very few of those films around.

Rob - Yeah a lot of people thought Pitt was distracting. I can see it, he essentially was just his character from Inglorious Basterds again, same accent and everything.

Another complaint I hear a lot is that people felt the movie didn't communicate the passage of time very well. But I felt this was perhaps done intentionally, I should probably stop here as to not venture into spoiler territory.

Originally posted by BackFire


Another complaint I hear a lot is that people felt the movie didn't communicate the passage of time very well. But I felt this was perhaps done intentionally, I should probably stop here as to not venture into spoiler territory.


What I didn't notice till the end of the movie was the very slight aging effect the time seemed to show on Solomon(like graying hair and the like)

Yeah, it was very subtle. I'm pretty sure a lot of people didn't notice that, period.

Originally posted by Robtard
-One actress's crying, again, felt forced and took you out of dismal surroundings and plight of the slaves/Solomon.

This is the ONLY gripe I had with the film. Very minimal. When Solomon is trying to get Eliza to stop mourning her children on the porch I, too, felt that her weeping was too forced and not convincing. But everything else in the scene worked(Ejiofor's acting, the dialogue, etc.).

I was literally discussing the films scenes with my friend who I saw it with for a few hours after watching it. There's no filler or any point where I felt "OK, let's move along". It all matters.

The cinematography, McQueen's long uncut camera sequences, Zimmer's subtle score(sounded a tad like he ripped off Inception in some areas but nevertheless very good), the amazing cast, etc.

This film should win a ton of Oscars.

Best Picture
Best Adaptation
Best Actor
Best Supporting Actor
Best Supporting Actress

If Tom Hanks wins over Ejiofor we're going to have serious problems. Don't get me wrong, Tom Hanks was great as was Captain Phillips but this film is in an entirely different stratosphere.

Absolutely agreed. Ejiofor needs to win, it'd be a travesty if he didn't. So much subtlety in his performance.

Finally saw it tonight. I can see what was meant that sentimentality was deliberately stripped from the film in order to not take away from the factual horror of slavery.

1 aspect I thought felt very forced and contrived was when Northrup was in the field listening to the crickets and he stares into the camera. It seemed an overly forced point of 'hey America. Look your shameful history in the eye. Face up to it'.

I'm not sure whether the matter-of-fact way in which the lynching and whipping were portrayed added or detracted from the impact of them.

I also think the passage of time didn't seem well done. You could be forgiven for thinking he spent only a few days with Benedict Cumberbatch's character and 1 or 2 days on the sugar plantation.

The performances are on the whole astounding.

Maybe the cultural impact is lost on me, not being American.

To be honest, I came away disappointed that I wasn't as emotionally impacted as I thought I would.

I was hoping for a 10. Something that hit like a ton of bricks like Schindler's List.

I got a 7.

That stare scene you refer to works perfectly when I watch it. As someone else already pointed out, there is so much subtle acting that goes into Ejiofor's performance. This scene in particular just painted a picture of there being no hope. His facial expression sold it all. The scene were he starts singing with the group of slaves just displayed the start of his inevitable assimilation.

It was a 10 for me. I'd put it right up there with Schindler's List.

Honestly, what's the point in making movies based on "the ugly & brutal side of history"?

I mean you walk away feeling an emotional wreck, feeling saddened by the plight of the characters in the story...but does it really change your outlook of life?

Do you feel the need to help/embrace African/Americans, Jews, refugees, the homeless, the drug addicts more?

I'm just curious that out of all the emotions we possess, why market a negative emotion & then make a movie that's guaranteed to leave you an emotional wreck afterwards?

Why not? You act as if filmmakers don't have the free range to make films exploring the opposite range of the emotional spectrum.

Originally posted by jaden101
Finally saw it tonight. I can see what was meant that sentimentality was deliberately stripped from the film in order to not take away from the factual horror of slavery.

1 aspect I thought felt very forced and contrived was when Northrup was in the field listening to the crickets and he stares into the camera. It seemed an overly forced point of 'hey America. Look your shameful history in the eye. Face up to it'.

I'm not sure whether the matter-of-fact way in which the lynching and whipping were portrayed added or detracted from the impact of them.

I also think the passage of time didn't seem well done. You could be forgiven for thinking he spent only a few days with Benedict Cumberbatch's character and 1 or 2 days on the sugar plantation.

The performances are on the whole astounding.

Maybe the cultural impact is lost on me, not being American.

To be honest, I came away disappointed that I wasn't as emotionally impacted as I thought I would.

I was hoping for a 10. Something that hit like a ton of bricks like Schindler's List.

I got a 7.

I personally thought the scene where Northup looks into the camera was the most impressive scene in the whole movie. It's actually extremely brave, from a filmmaking perspective, for a director to do that in a dramatic film. As it's considered a big no-no in dramatic films to have the character look into the camera as it can break the fourth wall and destroy immersion if not done properly. And I thought it was done flawlessly in this film.

I also think the matter of fact way the whipping was done was certainly beneficial. There are plenty of movies cinematizing whipping scenes and exaggerating them for dramatic effect, was refreshing to see it done in such an honest and straight forward way, for a change. Also the way that scene was filmed was a stroke of genius, I felt. As if watching from the eyes of a bystander, as opposed to disembodied cameras that can teleport around, as would happen in most films.

The passage of time thing is a common complaint. That was an intentional decision by the director to do it that way, for whatever reason. In the script there are actually time stamps on various scenes which give the date, and show how long he's been there and so on, but the director decided to not use those in the film. I'm guessing the reason for that is because in real life Northup didn't really know exactly how long he had been abducted till after he was released, he mentions this at the end when he says "I've had a difficult time these last several years" showing that he doesn't really know exactly how long he's been away. And so we can't either. Also it could have been done that way so that when he arrives home to his family it's actually quite jarring to see just how much his children have aged. I remember quite a few gasps in the theater at that point.

I've got it rated a 10/10. Think it's on par if not better than Schindler's List. Definitely had a greater emotional impact than Schindler's List, for me.

I didn't look at it like that at first, but going back on the movie and slavery in general. Once you get into that routine and are more about survival than anything, you stop counting the days and weeks, and they can seem to blend together. So it would make sense for him to just realize time is passing and not know the exacts of it.

The problem with the time not being shown isn't the issue with it. It's that it didn't feel like 12 years to audience when it would have felt more than 12 years to Northrup. It's a disjoin that is hard to reconcile, for me anyway.

I'm not saying Ejiofor wasn't excellent in the looking at the camera scene. His ability to express with out words in that scene was tremendous. You could almost read every thought he was having from the look on his face. It's just that the look directed at the audience had no subtlety in term of its purpose.

Several scenes were nigh on perfect. When Northrup is on his tip toes trying not to choke and the rest of the slaves are going about their business as if he's not there. The way the 1st shot lingers for ages on him.

The other being as he passes the lynching and only gets a fleeting glimpse of it and the look on his face as he walks away without looking back. I also liked the expression of guilt about leaving Patsey behind much like the other guy left him when they got off the boat.

Yeah, I get the time passage complaint, totally. I know that did bother quite a few people and it's a reasonable criticism. For me, didn't really hurt the film at all, though.

I honestly think Patsey is perhaps the film's greatest achievement. The amount of emotional resonance she was able to garner in a relatively short amount of screen time was exceptional.

And yeah, the looking into the camera scene wasn't all that subtle. That's fine by me, though, there were an almost overwhelming amount of other subtle moments in the film, having a few big ones like that, where the intent is obvious, isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Yeah the scene when she begged him to drown her in the river was pretty exceptional for a debut performance.

Yep. She was actually the source of pretty much all the most devastating scenes in the film for me.

I'm sticking to my guns with this as movie of the year for me but Wolf of Wall Street damn sure gave it a run for its money.

After reading this reviews I definitely have to see this movie.

Just saw this. One of the best films I have ever seen. The 21st century's Schindler's List. This movie will haunt me for a long time to come.

I seen this one the other week and surprised that i enjoyed it.....obviously nothing to do with the slavery aspect.

the comedic timing in this movie is impeccable.

Comedic timing? What comedy are you referring to?

fix your sarcasm detector.

Originally posted by marwash22
fix your sarcasm detector. What are you talking about? He doesn't have a sarcasm detector, that's not a real thing.

I was really hoping Django would bust in and kill Epps and his kunt wife

What a great movie. It really made slavery... watchable? No... larger than life? No... beautiful? No... anyway it was a good movie.

I watched this the other night actually. Was really blown away. It was superbly directed, acted, filmed, etc... all around great. Think it probably deserved Best Picture.

Originally posted by Patient_Leech
I watched this the other night actually. Was really blown away. It was superbly directed, acted, filmed, etc... all around great. Think it probably deserved Best Picture.

I just watched it last night as well. Amazingly done. I really liked how Brad Pitt character brought up "What is truth and right, will always be truth and right", when talking to a slave owner on the ideology of slavery and how he disagreed with it.