Amistad, a Steven Spielberg-directed production that was produced by Bob Cooper, depicts what happens after the slaves on the Amistad ship rebel. The movie revolves around the Africans' arrest, slavery, ability to overthrow and liberate themselves from their captors, and their trial in America. It was based on a screenplay by David Franzoni. (Motyl et al. 1). Spielberg expertly handles the directing of the movie with the well-written, gripping historical tale. After an inhumane abduction from Africa and a perilous voyage from West Africa to America, it reaches its pinnacle when Cinque releases himself from chains and frees his fellow African slaves. After killing his oppressors, the main character makes an attempt to travel back to Africa. The actions are influential and of great disturbance, evoking all sorts of sufferings and pity experienced by the slaves.
The title of the film Amistad is a name given to the ship sailing to the U.S. from Cuba in 1839 (Motyl et al. 1). It is holding in bondage a cargo of African slaves sold in Cuba. Immediately the ship crosses the border of Cuba to the United States, Cinque, an African tribal leader of the mutiny takes over the ship after killing their captors. They continue with their journey to the U.S. hoping to find favor on landing. Unfortunately, they are sent to prison on arrival and accused as runaway slaves. Language barrier seems to doom them to death for slaying their captors. Abolitionist layer takes up their case, siding with them that they are not slaves but free citizens of another nation. The case is brought to the Supreme Court, where they get justice through John Quincy. The film shows the slave saga in 1839, a period of Spain-America relations, and it uncovers the machinations of politics, which led to the civil war in America (Motyl et al. 1). The movie attains its best when Hounsou comes on the screen. Hounsou restates the greatness of the main character by exuding his dignity even when enslaved. This incidence is to sound a sense of humility, strength, and courage to the viewers of Amistad. The film is a courtroom drama, primarily a manipulative one with a pretentious direction where characters rise above the movie’s script.
The 12 Years a Slave is a film produced and directed by Steve McQueen surrounding the life of an educated free black man residing in Saratoga, New York (McQueen et al. 1). The film starts in Saratoga Springs, which is apparently the central character’s hometown. Solomon, the protagonist in the film, resides with his family trying to make ends meet. The setting of the film is then moved to Washington, D.C, located in the Southern State, where Solomon is forcefully demanded for his labor. The protagonist is abducted and sold into slavery where he is subjected to brutal working conditions and forced labor. While in slavery, he witnesses the highest level of torture and barbarity under the control of Epps, particularly Frail Patsey. However, he does not allow himself to be overcome by despair. His main aim is survival and determination to get his freedom.
McQueen’s movie began in 1841 when two men approach him for help (McQueen et al. 1). He is drugged and sent into slavery in the South. He struggles to survive, believing that cooperation is the best means of survival. He meets several other slaves who are in the same situation as he is and builds good rapport with them. However, Solomon is separated from his friends, and this continues throughout his period of slavery. The narrator realizes that cooperation leads to nowhere, he decides not to fall into despair anymore. Instead, he provides labor in different plantations under abusive treatments of various masters until he meets a Canadian abolitionist, Bass, who turns his life for the better.
The 12 Years a Slave aims at revealing the brutality and inhumane phenomena experienced by the slaves in the 19th century. On the other hand, Amistad also revolves around the open killing and slaughtering of human. Precisely, the two films share a common theme of human suffering. Perhaps McQueen is concerned with sufferings of the slaves when he infuses his signature and acknowledges sex. Although the performances of notable characters such as Brad Pitt, Paul Dano, and Giammati are adequate, it is still a reminder to the viewers of the film that it is just a movie, grabbing away the uninterruptedly immersed hope of the people due in harrowing.
Just like in Spielberg's Amistad, McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave makes use of the faces adequately and excellently by unearthing their inner thoughts, and foreshadowing, which is provoked and anticipated by the music; giving rise to desperations, minimal hopes, and powerful adversities. McQueen does not reveal his perspective. Instead, he allows the audience of the movie to soak the situations and interpret the sufferings and survival without the discerning eye for revenge, justice, and redemption (McQueen et al. 1). Ostensibly, the direction, screenplay, and music presented in the two films are enough to speak for the films.
It is justifiable to claim that the two films, Amistad and 12 Years a Slave have a lot to share. Both Spielberg and McQueen have justified an increase in standardized production of projects worth awarding. The subject matters here are compelling stories of intoxicating worlds and injustices imposed by masters on their subjects. These two movies view the blacks as subject to their white masters, elucidating the theme of slavery.
Some of the themes worth restating in the two films are the themes of suffering, struggle for survival, and personal freedom (Motyl et al. 1). Both the two films are representations of the slavery horrors and the depictions of how the African-Americans struggle to survive under the suffocating and disorganized world of arbitrary control. Spielberg’s Amistad is unique film in the way the themes of sufferings and survival are presented. The two films present cases of flashbacks when the enslaved Africans fighting for their freedom are recaptured in the scene. The scenes of the enslaved African bodies in chains accompany the images. Whereas the scenes of mutilation were used as imagery to represent the human suffering, brutality in the scenes represented the lack of freedom among the people of color. The overflowing blood is a visceral horror depicting enslavement, which captures the attention of the audience.
The distinctive approach used in the Amistad film portrays how the muscular bodies go against their captors who have forcefully imprisoned them. The afflicting bodies in the ship serve as a reminder of the pain inflicted on others. The unfriendly and inhuman treatments of the slaves in the film Amistad is used ironically in the film to mean friendly (Motyl et al. 1). Just like in Amistad, the 12 Years a Slave speaks even louder about the sufferings that the slaves went through under the regime of the white men. It is an accurate representation and the verified accounts of the experience of the common slaves in the United States during pre-civil wars. Right from the beginning, the truth regarding the people, their places their daily practices and about the time is incorporated in finer details in the protagonist's story. This serves as an indictment of the ill-practices of human slavery. Northup endures uncountable abuses; he is degraded, violently robbed his emotional, spiritual and physical riches and suffers awful torments.
Within the ship of sufferings of the slaves in the McQueen' film are the desperate women’ Eliza and Patsey. “They represent the awful and bitter inconsolable sorrows in the slavery camps that people go through; cutting from their families and reduced to lone rangers with grief and isolations” (McQueen et al. 1). 12 Years a Slave is indeed a reality of what it means to be in bondage of slavery where brutality is the order of the day and the ripping off the slave of identities was not a big deal. The character formation in the two films is made in an engaging manner that creates curiosity in audience leaving them with the desire to watch the films repeatedly. The protagonists in the two films have troubles getting what they need most, which in both cases is their freedom. They are heroes to empathize with however much they act bravely to reach their goals.
Amistad is costumed in a historical manner, accurately placed in post-colonial Americas believable in the courtroom (Motyl et al. 1). The illusions here are completed inadequately. Perhaps, Spielberg's aim is to devise a special look for the ship in the film. Moreover, the opening sequences not ignoring others, there is the employment of streaking cuts and harsh shadows showing the dark skin of Africans. McQueen's movie, on the other hand, has unbelievable costumes of laborers in plantations. The colored dresses of Patsey are kinds of second-hand given to her by momms Epps after she got tired of using them. Solomon's Syracuse is a symbolism of a free black man.
Just like any other art, these two films have far-reaching lessons that the audience can extract from watching them. 12 Years a Slave, in particular, has a direct connection to our world today because slavery did not end with people like Solomon getting freedom. Many forms of enslavement still exist in society today. Bonded labor, sexual enslavement, child labor and forced labor persist in many countries today. Amistad, on the other hand, portrays dehumanization based on race though not movingly and convincingly. It also uncovers the goodness of human within horrors.
Works Cited
McQueen, Steve, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Dano, and Solomon Northup. 12 Años Esclavo =12 Years a Slave. México: Zima Entertainment, 2014.
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Motyl, H D, Warneke J. Smith, Alfre Woodard, Charles Durning, Brock Peters, F M. Higginbotham, Clifton H. Johnson, and Cheryl Johnson-Odim. The Voyage of La Amistad: A Quest for Freedom. 2014. United States: MPI Home Video
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