Essay On 12 Years A Slave

The crack of a whip followed by a blood-curling scream of a slave named Patsey echoes through a large cotton plantation in Louisiana in 1842. Patsey’s cheek is pressed up against a hard and rough wood pillar while her friend and fellow slave “Platt, or Solomon Northup, strikes her naked back. Demanded by their master Edwin Epps, Northup must punish Patsey for running off by whipping her as on-lookers watch. Blood spatters off her back and into the face of a man who has seen freedom and now the disturbing reality of slavery. Her cries fade into moans and Northup can whip her no more. Epps takes over the beating while Northup reminds his master somewhere someday he will answer for this sin. Staring at a brutally mangled body of a human being Epps responds with the quote, “there is no sin, man does how he pleases with his property”. Produced in 2012 and directed by Steve McQueen 12 Years a Slave brings the true story of Solomon Northup’s encounter with slavery in America in the 1840’s. 12 Years a Slave strips away the Hollywood version of slavery to reveal the brutal, …show more content…
In 2012 the media was plastered with stories of whites killing, harming or unjustly treated African American’s as inferior human beings. The plot of 12 Years a Slave contains stories of just that. Laid out in an unapologetic, raw and brutal way McQueen shares the story of a once free man, Solomon Northup. This film is cry to the people of the United States to see slavery as it was, not the way we have seen it played down throughout the years. The film’s heart-wrenching screens grab audiences and shake them down to see the reality of life as a slave. Northup once a free man must fight for his right to be treated as a human being. Many African American’s feel this same pressure today in our country. This film was not only an ode to history, but a cry to examine modern times as