Two men labor on sweltering a Louisiana
afternoon, planing wood and hammering nails into an small unfinished
building. To their own eyes, they are equal; sharing conversation and
stories of their lives. But equal they are not; one a free white man
working for wage, the other a black man in bondage, working simply
because it is what he was sold to do. “Your story is amazing,”
the free man says to the slave. “And in no good way.” That really
is the most essential way to describe the incredible true story of
Solomon Northrup, who was kidnapped from his home and family to be
sold into slavery. Based on Northrup's 1853 memoir, Steve McQueen's
12 Years a Slave stares unblinking into arguably the darkest
chapter of the United States' history, making a case for itself as
the definitive American horror story.
In 1814, still 59 years before the
Emancipation Proclamation, Solomon Northrup (Chiwetel Ejiofor) lives
as an upstanding citizen in Saratoga, NY – an atypically
progressive community for its time. A gifted violinist by trade and a
decent man by nature, he is free and proud to walk the streets with
his family, wearing his finest clothes, frequenting the finest shops,
sheltered from common bigotry by his respected status. But this dream
existence proves to be just that: a dream – one from which he
awakens in shackles, alone and confused in a cold, dark cell. Daring
to insist to his captors that he is free man and justice shall be
done, he is flogged, menaced, and stripped of his identity along with
his bloodied shirt. He is Solomon Northrup no more. He is a “Georgia
runaway” by the name of Platt, or so he must pretend if he wishes
to survive his waking nightmare.
