12 Years a Slave 《为奴十二载》

Director: Steve McQueen
Actors: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch
导演：史蒂夫·麦奎因
主演：切瓦特·埃加福特 / 迈克尔·法斯宾德 /
本尼迪克特·康伯巴奇

By Yanyun Wang

Looking back to the history of film, there are plenty of movies which are based on slaves’ life, like Amistad, For Massa’s Sake, The Birth of a Nation, Django Unchained and so on. But 12 Years a Slave is adopted by a novel which is a true story also. The protagonist Solomon is a freeman at that time, and he plays violin for a living. Solomon has a wife and two children. However a performance trade changes his life upsidedown. He turns to be a slave after a sleeping night. During his helpless slave life, he is sold to two planters on southern plantations. Within the 12 years, Solomon has witnessed a lot of unfair tragedy until he meet a progressive man. But can Solomon change his destiny?

The scriptwriters of 12 Years a Slave are John Ridley and Solomon Northup himself. So the movie shows Solomon’s slave life with no hiding and faking. Moreover, in this movie, audience has the same perspective with the duped Solomon. Both of us are unfamiliar with slavery. Each audience explores the dispiteous moments through Solomon’s eyes, so during watching, we are Solomon. Meanwhile, the movies will resonate with audience, that when our dignity is violated, when the fair is taken, being a man, how to trust yourself, how to live under an extremely relentless environment.

在世界电影史上，讲诉黑奴的电影有很多。例如《为了主人》、《勇者无惧》、《一个国家的诞生》、《被解放的姜戈》等等，而本片是以真实故事的 小说所改编。片中的所罗门本是一个自由人，以演奏小提琴为生，有一个妻子和两个孩子。但一次演出交易使他一觉醒来成了黑奴。在无奈的黑奴生涯中，他辗转被卖给了两位庄园主，在12年里，所罗门目睹了许多黑奴的悲剧，直到他遇到了一位思想进步人士。但他是否能够结束他身为奴隶的命运呢？

本片的编剧是由约翰 ? 里德利和所罗门 ? 诺萨普自己担当，电影情节几乎与当时所罗门的经历无出其右。此外，本片的精彩之处在于观众和被欺骗的所罗门一样，对奴隶制非常陌生，每一位观众都是透过所罗门的眼睛去初探种种残忍的细节，所以在观影的过程中，我们每个人都是所罗门。同时本片还能引起共鸣思考，即当最基本的尊严被侵犯时，当一切公平被剥夺时，作为一个人，应该如何去坚守自我，该如何在极端命运中生存。

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