I enjoyed this film. I’m really interested to see if it sparks any conversations around Blacks and Christianity; the film has HEAVY religious connotations and really delves into the duality of the Christian experience for blacks (it being the religion that was forced onto African Americans by their tormentors and used to justify their inhumane treatment but also being the religion that gave African Americans hope that they could survive their ordeal).
It’s not a straight line retelling of the story (what historical film is) but, there was some concern about them taking out the part of the revolt where women and children were killed. I’m not sure that was entirely the case as there was a slaveholder’s wife present in bed when a house was ransacked and she wasn’t let go. But still, I think the movie missed an opportunity to provide commentary on, and explore the question of, the cost of freedom that could be connected to modern day war. A common criticism of the Nat Turner revolt is the killing of women and children during it yet, women and children have been killed in all of America’s “fights for freedom” in foreign conflicts over the past two centuries. Why is this “collateral damage” as its often called ok in the “liberation” of Iraq, or Syria, or the Philippines but not to end American slavery? The movie could have said something about this but didn’t. Missed opportunity.
Despite that, I still think the fight for freedom presented and the parallels that can be drawn to present day struggles will resonate for many. And, the slavery presented on screen isn’t a sanitized one with white saviors who are reluctant participants in the institution. It is shown that everyone is complicit in the sick practice in some form, no matter how light. Even the plantation matriarch that teaches Nat how to read and largely treated him better than the male slavers won’t let him read more intellectual books because “they’re full of things his kind wouldn’t understand” but does give him a Bible. A realistic, non-watered down portrayal of American slavery that we don’t often see in the mainstream. That’s needed as well. Even though I think the film misses an opportunity to ask some pertinent, heavier questions, I think it’s still worth seeing.
Image: Fox Searchlight
