12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen)

[EyesWideOpen]

Serious dramatic retellings of historical events were not exploitation films. Django Unchained could be considered a exploitation film. 12 Years a Slave is not.

[Grouchy]

You're just saying that because of the way the two movies are sold.

How is the "seriousness" different from the "seriousness" of a rape-and-revenge film like Thriller? What makes 12 Years a Slave more serious, besides the fact that it's based on a true story?

[EyesWideOpen]

You're just saying that because of the way the two movies are sold.

How is the "seriousness" different from the "seriousness" of a rape-and-revenge film like Thriller? What makes 12 Years a Slave more serious, besides the fact that it's based on a true story?

Thriller is "over the top". 12 Years a Slave is not. Thriller has a woman wearing an eyepatch and blowing away her captors intermixed with porn scenes. Are you trying to say they are the same type of "serious'?

[Grouchy]

Thriller is "over the top". 12 Years a Slave is not. Thriller has a woman wearing an eyepatch and blowing away her captors intermixed with porn scenes. Are you trying to say they are the same type of "serious'?

The structure of the two films is pretty similar, though, isn't it? The main character is kidnapped and things just get worse and worse until they escape the ordeal. Sure, there is no revenge possible in 12 Years a Slave, but honestly, I don't find Steve McQueen's way of manipulating the audience all that different.

Django Unchained might be more pulpy and trashy on the surface, but it actually has some pretty valuable insights about the subjects of race and slavery. The infamous phrenology scene or the dialogue with Don Johnson's character where he has trouble explaining how his slaves should treat Django. 12 Years doesn't have that kind of thing - it's almost in survival horror territory.

[EyesWideOpen]

Besides the fact that every director is trying to manipulate the audience I'm not really sure what you're getting at. They are both escape films sure I don't think that automatically makes them both exploitation films. I thought both films were great (Django & 12 Years) but Django is a better movie I'll agree with you there but I would have had no issue if it would have won best picture also.

[Grouchy]

I guess what I'm trying to say is that showing brutality and torture on screen used to be privative to B movies and exploitation features, but now it has found its way into the mainstream. Just that. It's not really a jab at 12 Years a Slave. I can't imagine the same movie being made pre-Passion of the Christ, for example. It would have been regarded as too shocking.

[Lazlo]

I guess what I'm trying to say is that showing brutality and torture on screen used to be privative to B movies and exploitation features, but now it has found its way into the mainstream. Just that. It's not really a jab at 12 Years a Slave. I can't imagine the same movie being made pre-Passion of the Christ, for example. It would have been regarded as too shocking.

Schindler's List covers similar material with similar explicit detail. Is it an exploitation film?

[Pop Trash]

Silence of the Lambs won BP. A Clockwork Orange and The Exorcist were nominated. Platoon won BP with a child rape scene and Sheen repeatedly shooting an unarmed Vietnamese civilian point blank.

[dreamdead]

This one has been circulating film round-ups the last day or so. It's not especially valuable, but worth noting for the way it attempts to rationalize ideas and discuss "propaganda":

If ever in slavery’s 250-year history in North America there were a kind master or a contented slave, as in the nature of things there must have been, here and there, we may be sure that Mr McQueen does not want us to hear about it. This, in turn, surely means that his view of the history of the American South is as partial and one-sided as that of the hated Gone With the Wind. That professional historians among others insist on calling such propaganda “truth” and “reality” and condemning anyone who suggests truth and reality might be more complicated than that is one measure of the politicization of historical scholarship in our time — to a level, perhaps, rivaling even that of film studies.

[Qrazy]

Cumberbatch's character was presented as fairly kind and the female slave who married a white plantation owner is contented. So their argument against the film doesn't hold a lot of weight for me. That said, I don't like the film for other reasons. I find the line delivery extremely theatrical and at odds with the way Bobbitt shot it. And while I don't find it's presentation of slavery one sided I do find it schematic. It actively demonstrates many different combinations of opinions and attitudes concerning slavery instead of just existing in the time period and world it has created.

[Grouchy]

I don't like the movie, but that article is just brimming with ugly unsaid subtext. In any case, the film is propaganda of what? Black people? Doesn't make sense to me.

[Dukefrukem]

I guess what I'm trying to say is that showing brutality and torture on screen used to be privative to B movies and exploitation features, but now it has found its way into the mainstream. Just that. It's not really a jab at 12 Years a Slave. I can't imagine the same movie being made pre-Passion of the Christ, for example. It would have been regarded as too shocking.

This is quite the observation! I'm surprised there wasn't more of a discussion surrounding this at the time. Just got around to watching this. Definitely wasn't expecting it to be as raw as it turned out to be.