This Steven Spielberg-directed exploration into a long-ago episode in African-American history recounts the trial that followed the 1839 rebellion aboard the Spanish slave ship Amistad and captures the complex political maneuverings set in motion by the event. Filmed in New England and Puerto Rico, the 152-minute drama opens with a pre-credit sequence showing Cinque (Djimon Hounsou) and the other Africans in a violent takeover of the Amistad. Captured, they are imprisoned in New England where
former slave Theodore Joadson (Morgan Freeman), viewing the rebels as "freedom fighters," approaches property lawyer Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey), who attempts to prove the Africans were "stolen goods" because they were kidnapped. Running for re-election, President Martin Van Buren (Nigel Hawthorne) overturns the lower court's decision in favor of the Africans. Former President John Quincy Adams (Anthony Hopkins) is reluctant to become involved, but when the case moves on to the Supreme Court, Adams stirs emotions with a powerful defense. The storyline occasionally cuts away to Spain where the young Queen Isabella (Anna Paquin) plays with dolls; she later debated the Amistad case with seven U.S. presidents. The character portrayed by Morgan Freeman is a fictional composite of several historical figures. For authentic speech, the Africans speak the Mende language, subtitled during some scenes but not others. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi
Spielberg seems to be dividing his filmmaking output into two distinct halves: in the summer months cranking out no-brainer dinosaur flicks...in the winter season unveiling his serious artistic stuff to edify the adults and woo the Oscar crowd.
Amistad is worth seeing just for people to know about this important story, this moment in history. But from the world's most powerful, successful and famous director, we expect more.
Aiming to instruct and entertain, and often struggling to reconcile these goals, Amistad lacks the subtlety of tone and simplicity of form that made Schindler's List one of Spielberg's very best; here, however, every idea and image are too explicit.
Fortunately, the dry, courtroom banter is interjected with powerful accounts of the violent, inhumane atrocities inflicted on the slaves by Spanish merchants.
This is the most straightforward, understated, and powerful big-screen representation of the gospel in recent movie history. And for that, Amistad should be recommended to everyone.
As with Schindler’s List, Spielberg allows his subjects to be remote and somewhat unknowable human beings, creating an air of documentary-like authenticity.
Spielberg's films never lack a certain degree of narrative and visual force, but his tendency toward sentimentality, a strictly antipodal, Good-vs.-Bad conception of character, and an insensitivity to structure have consistently marred his work...
Despite its occasional imperfections...Amistad must be regarded as a monumentally impressive achievement and further proof of Spielberg's ongoing maturation as an artist.
A good handful of poignant scenes and numerous others in-between centered around logistics -- just how does a western lawyer in the 1840s connect with African clients who's language he doesn't understand? I wish that Spielberg had followed the advice that John Quincy Adams gives in the movie and showed us more about
Cinque's story before he was kidnapped.
Slaves rebel aboard the ship taking them to market, setting off Speilberg's telling of the true story that eventually inveighed an ex-President of the United States in the trial for the lives of the slaves. All get through this relatively unscathed, though there doesn't seem to be much effort in any of it. It's
easily Hopkins' picture as the curious, way-past-his-prime Adams mainly because nobody else has really anything to do. Still maybe a decent effort.
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