Filed from Park City on 1.25.16: “This is a sentimental, briefly stirring, Braveheart-like attempt to deify a brave African-American hero — Nat Turner, the leader of a Virginia slave rebellion in August 1831. But a black Braveheart or Spartacus this is not. Nor is it, by my sights, an award-quality thing.
The Birth of a Nation (Fox Searchlight, 10.7) “will almost certainly be Best Picture-nominated, as it delivers a myth that many out there will want to see and cheer. But don’t kid yourself about how good and satisfying this film is. It’s mostly a mediocre exercise in deification and sanctimony. I loved the rebellion as much as the next guy but it takes way too long to arrive — 90 minutes.
“Nate Parker, the director, writer and star, sank seven years of his life into this film, and invested as much heart, love and spiritual light into the narrative as he could. But the bottom line is that he’s more into making sure that the audience reveres the halo around Turner’s head and less into crafting a movie that really grabs and gets you, or at least pulls you in with the harsh realism, riveting performances and narrative, atmospheric discipline that made Steve McQueen‘s 12 Years A Slave an undisputed masterpiece.
“As noted, Parker doesn’t seem to even respect the fact that he needs to deliver the historic rebellion (obviously the crucial element with horribly oppressed African-Americans hatcheting white slave-owners to our considerable satisfaction) within a reasonable time frame, which would be 45 minutes to an hour, tops. Kirk Douglas and his fellows broke out of Peter Ustinov‘s gladiator training school around the 45-minute mark.
“I realize that the Turner-led slave rebellion was suppressed within two days, but in Parker’s movie it’s over before you know it. I’ve been waiting 90 minutes for the rancid whiteys to get their comeuppance, and Turner’s small army is surrounded and defeated within 15 minutes? That’s not satisfying, dude. No way would Douglas and Stanley Kubrick have kept their gladiators in Capua for 90 minutes and then had Laurence Olivier‘s Crassus defeat them within a quarter of an hour.”
