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It's far from comfortable viewing, but 12 Years a Slave's unflinchingly brutal look at American slavery is also brilliant -- and quite possibly essential -- cinema.
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All Critics (359) | Top Critics (64) | Fresh (342) | Rotten (17)
12 Years a Slave is, like The Trial, a trapdoor over the abyss. Although less abrupt than Kafka's novel, the movie wastes little time before plunging its viewer into a nightmare of dehumanization. March 4, 2018 | Full Review…
12 Years a Slave is, like The Trial, a trapdoor over the abyss. Although less abrupt than Kafka's novel, the movie wastes little time before plunging its viewer into a nightmare of dehumanization.
J. Hoberman
It speaks to the courage and resilience of one man, the savagery of many, and the potential, for both good and for ill, in us all. January 13, 2015 | Rating: 4/4 | Full Review…
It speaks to the courage and resilience of one man, the savagery of many, and the potential, for both good and for ill, in us all.
Steven Rea
In its own saintly manner, it's as exploitative as anything critics accused Django Unchained of being, minus Tarantino's eye for idiosyncrasy and sense of humor. January 13, 2015 | Rating: 1/5 | Full Review…
In its own saintly manner, it's as exploitative as anything critics accused Django Unchained of being, minus Tarantino's eye for idiosyncrasy and sense of humor.
Scott Marks
The film tells an irresistibly powerful story, in a way that does not shirk the horror. It is unbearable to watch at times, but that is as it should be. January 13, 2015 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
The film tells an irresistibly powerful story, in a way that does not shirk the horror. It is unbearable to watch at times, but that is as it should be.
Paul Byrnes
A film that, despite its surface simplicity, proves to be riven with contradictions to the point of incoherence. January 13, 2015 | Rating: 2.5/5 | Full Review…
A film that, despite its surface simplicity, proves to be riven with contradictions to the point of incoherence.
Jake Wilson
Ejiofor projects extraordinary integrity, even nobility - and he holds the camera magnificently. It's a deeply inward, deeply felt performance, surely a cert for one of the many Oscars this film must win. January 10, 2014 | Rating: 5/5 | Full Review…
Ejiofor projects extraordinary integrity, even nobility - and he holds the camera magnificently. It's a deeply inward, deeply felt performance, surely a cert for one of the many Oscars this film must win.
David Sexton
Overall, 12 Years a Slave is a brave piece of filmmaking and one to last through the ages in terms of acting and storytelling. November 26, 2019 | Rating: 3.5/5 | Full Review…
Overall, 12 Years a Slave is a brave piece of filmmaking and one to last through the ages in terms of acting and storytelling.
Katie Smith-Wong
12 Years a Slave occupies that sparsely inhabited place beyond Oscar statues and Tomatometer scores, in the upper stratosphere of movies that act as time machine and history professor. It is, for want of a better word, important. August 27, 2019 | Rating: A+ | Full Review…
12 Years a Slave occupies that sparsely inhabited place beyond Oscar statues and Tomatometer scores, in the upper stratosphere of movies that act as time machine and history professor. It is, for want of a better word, important.
Ryan Syrek
The film itself is beautiful. Each shot is pure artwork. Each note of music is pure emotion. Every cut is perfectly pieced together. Steve McQueen has assembled something that is great. August 8, 2019 | Full Review…
The film itself is beautiful. Each shot is pure artwork. Each note of music is pure emotion. Every cut is perfectly pieced together. Steve McQueen has assembled something that is great.
Karl Delossantos
Exquisitely built, so expertly acted and so fearlessly directed. July 31, 2019 | Full Review…
Exquisitely built, so expertly acted and so fearlessly directed.
Leslie Combemale
It's an exhausting journey through one man's experiences being denied his humanity, a decade living as property. There's no lesson to be learned. If you need a movie to tell you that slavery is wrong, well, this movie isn't for you. No movie is. July 16, 2019 | Rating: 8/10 | Full Review…
It's an exhausting journey through one man's experiences being denied his humanity, a decade living as property. There's no lesson to be learned. If you need a movie to tell you that slavery is wrong, well, this movie isn't for you. No movie is.
Dominic Griffin
Too often have [slavery's] horrors been whitewashed in popular culture, but here at last McQueen lays them bare through the eyes and words of a man who experienced the unthinkable. June 9, 2019 | Rating: 4/4 | Full Review…
Too often have [slavery's] horrors been whitewashed in popular culture, but here at last McQueen lays them bare through the eyes and words of a man who experienced the unthinkable.
Matthew Lucas
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