Amistad (1997)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
In 1839, the slave ship Amistad set sail from Cuba to America. During the long trip, Cinque leads the slaves in an unprecedented uprising. They are then held prisoner in Connecticut, and their release becomes the subject of heated debate. Freed slave Theodore Joadson wants Cinque and the others exonerated and recruits property lawyer Roger Baldwin to help his case. Eventually, John Quincy Adams also becomes an ally.
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What critics compared Amistad to
Of course, it's a coincidence that Django Unchained arrives in the same season as Steven Spielberg's Lincoln, the second of two Spielberg films about slavery (after 1997's Amistad) that never expose audiences to the harsh realities of plantation life?
Yes, you will laugh at people saying the n-word, but I bet you’ll also be more viscerally disgusted than you would be watching Amistad or Glory (and yo, isn’t that the point?).
Films like "Lincoln" and "Amistad," and TV shows like "Roots" provide history lessons that show us the horrors and inhumanity of slavery, and how it should be abolished and condemned.
In truth, there have been conspicuously few American films made about slavery, but certainly Django Unchained is a far cry from, say, Amistad or Glory; there is no kowtowing seriousness here to placate political correctness or soothe white guilt.
In recent years, there have been attempts to present a more realistic depiction of slavery in projects like "Roots" and "Amistad" but those efforts, however well-intentioned they may have been, have come across as so self-satisfied in regards to their worthiness that it feels as if the filmmakers are exploiting the subject in order to win awards and acclaim for themselves instead of telling a compelling story.
With a talented, majority black cast, a director with a distinctive voice and several technical triumphs, including some incredible costume design by two-time Oscar nominee Ruth Carter (Amistad, Malcolm X), Black Panther is a superhero highpoint for the history books.
What it is, though, is the most purely expressive workout of a theme Spielberg has tackled before, in Lincoln and the earlier Amistad: the moment when the misty-eyed principles of American democracy get measured against its laws and policies.
When Steven Spielberg rolls up his sleeves and digs into the past to make a serious historical film like Amistad or Lincoln, loaded adjectives like “old-fashioned,” “patriotic,” and “sober” tend to get tossed around.
His “Amistad” told the story of how John Quincy Adams’s successfully defended the slaves who had taken over a ship after killing most of its crew, a film that is marred by its failure to dramatize the abolitionist movement’s efforts on their behalf, a flaw of his “Lincoln” as well.
Unlike "Munich" or "Amistad," the new movie benefits from an ebullient script originally written by playwright Matt Charman and punched up by Joel and Ethan Coen.
If it's true that all films manipulate but we only complain when they do it poorly (and it's more true than not), then let me complain that Spielberg is an absolute visual savant--proof of it in the first ten, wordless minutes of Bridge of Spies (compare it to the wordless section of Amistad)--and an absolute pandering whore in his inability to deliver an ambiguous ending.
Spielberg relishes, too, Donovan’s shrewd lawyering, which links him to the more famous attorneys played by Anthony Hopkins and Daniel Day-Lewis in Amistad and Lincoln respectively.
For once, history is presented as personal and immediate, not a saga relying on scholarly works and court records à la " Amistad ."
If you’ve ever seen “Amistad” and recall the disturbing scene where slaves shackled to each other, some weak, some hale and some dead, are dumped into the ocean, where they all go down in a daisy chain of certain death, that’s the type of grim inhumanity that fills the middle third of “Slave.”
Ejiofor, who played the Royal Navy interpreter in Steven Spielberg's slave mutiny film Amistad (that legal case reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1841, the same year Northup was kidnapped), gives body and soul to his role in 12 Years a Slave.
Steven Spielberg’s Amistad was more about abolitionists; as with Schindler’s List, oppressed characters were in the background.
Whilst 12 Years may lack the grandiose scale of Amistad, McQueen's ability to extract tension and provide insight into the evil nature of men during a dark period in America's history, makes for compelling viewing.
Having made his big-screen debut in Steven Spielberg's flawed but earnest Amistad in 1997, Ejiofor has turned his hand to romantic comedy (Love Actually, Melinda and Melinda), earthy drama (Dirty Pretty Things, American Gangster), fantastical science-fiction (Serenity, Children of Men) and even offbeat campy quirk (Kinky Boots) with confidence and agility.
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Sin embargo, cabe apuntar que The Post... tiene poco del maniqueísmo de obras como El color púrpura o Amistad, mientras que su discurso esquiva el heroísmo sin fisuras de Rescatando al soldado Ryan.
Films like Munich, Amistad and Lincoln have shown that Steven Spielberg loves to dip into the history books, but he never made a movie set in the past with quite as much contemporary resonance as The Post.
At worst, he can bore you to tears ( Lincoln , Amistad ).
Based on the complex legal aftermath of an 1839 slave revolt, Amistad doesn't have the emotional heft of Schindler's List or The Color Purple , but it's a distinguished, well-acted historical drama.
The historical drama of Amistad , or the war epics Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan ?
As for director Steven Spielberg, well, recall that he made Jurassic Park and Schindlers List in 1993 and The Lost World and Amistad in 1997.
List, Amistad , Saving Private Ryan , A.I. , and Minority Report .
These two films showed a maturity even beyond that of Schindler's List or Amistad because they showed Spielberg's ability to provoke deep thinking AND be a masterful entertainer.
The basic premise, as put forth by screenwriter David Franzoni ("Gladiator," "Amistad") is that Arthur was the leader of a group of Sarmatian knights, indentured military servants to the Roman Empire.
With a better script -- David Franzoni ( Amistad ) merely takes his own Gladiator screenplay and does it up Lord of the Rings lite -- one that gave Owen some actual interaction beyond that with his horse and his sword, this could have been a showcase for his devastating intensity.
It's true that screenwriter David Franzoni (Amistad, Gladiator) has discarded or downplayed the most romantic elements of the Arthurian legend -- there's no quest for the Holy Grail, no Camelot, and Merlin is just a weird old king instead of a sorcerer -- but much of what he's put in his script comes from the oldest versions of the myth, not from new scholarship based on fresh archaeological findings.
The only facts I can see about this Arthur narrative is that it's based on a single archaeological theory--mostly conjecture, supposition, and guess work--and the vivid imaginations of screenwriter David Franzoni ("Jumpin' Jack Flash," "Amistad," "Gladiator"), producer Jerry Bruckheimer ("Pearl Harbor," "Armageddon," "Pirates of the Caribbean"), and director Antoine Fuqua ("Bait," "Training Day," "Lightning in a Bottle").
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Like Steven Spielberg with Schindler’s List and Amistad , Scott respects his material by depicting it impersonally, with the focus on the event itself rather than some drama of irrelevant "characters" (cf.
But then there's the problem of the sequences that actually do introduce and conclude this picture, and they are as clunky, as ornery to our dramatic sensibilities, as was the jarringly false Liam Neeson speech at the end of Schindler, or the eloquent but overly studied John Quincy Adams speech in the last act of Amistad .
If Steven Spielberg hadn't already made "Schindler's List" and "Amistad," people would be shocked to see him listed as the director of "Saving Private Ryan."
Other American or Americana icons intrude with less of a half-life: the impossibly Arcadian Ryan family farm--complete with a hoop-skirted woman silhouetted in a doorway--is a forgivable tribute to John Ford; meanwhile, General George C. Marshall's recitation of a letter signed by Abraham Lincoln (previously invoked in Spielberg's Amistad) is troublesome because Marshall is a real-life figure known, as far as this movie's backstory is concerned, for ordering that Mrs. Sullivan's only surviving son be "snatched" from the front lines and sent home.
Movie #1- Basically, Spielberg tries to win back the Academy's heart after "Amistad"'s undeserved failure.
The opening half hour of the latest "important" film from director Steven Spielberg (an Amistad as opposed to a Lost World) perfectly sums up the powerful brutality and cheap sentimentality that are, equally, Saving Private Ryan.