Movie Review: 'Emancipation' Is Impressive But Still Follows Will Smith Formula
LOS ANGELES, Dec. 5 (UPI) -- Liberation , in theaters today and Friday on Apple TV+, is another Will Smith action movie. This may undermine its claim to be a great historical drama, but it remains a stunning Hollywood epic.
In 1863, after the Declaration of Independence, Louisiana was returned from plantation to the Confederate Army. Peter and two other slaves (Gilbert Owuare, Michael Luoye) escaped after being subjected to cruel torture and abuse.
The first indication that Emancipation is still a Will Smith blockbuster is that Peter saves the lives of his captors especially during his escape. He looks like a movie star, afraid his fans will feel sorry for him if he even kills another racist slave in self-defense.
Peter kills later in the film, but only when he has to.
Confederate Rangers led by Jim Fassel (Ben Foster) chase Peter through the swamp, and the chase is hilarious. While the story of Emancipation is based on an escaped slave, the danger from the hostile people and dangerous environment is obvious.
The horsemen following Peter were reckless, and any white citizen they met was likely to raise the alarm. Peter encounters a natural disaster in a swamp and must meet his medical needs and find food while on the run.
Freedom's products strive to convey the grandeur of Louisiana's Civil War era. Footage of a vast construction site filled with hammering, drilling and hauling more wood along railroad tracks.
Peter then walks across an empty battlefield strewn with corpses and debris, and the film ends with the battle between Union and Confederate soldiers. Peter's wife Dodine (Charmaine Bingwa) grows a full cotton gin on her farm.
In an age of digital films made mostly by Smith, Smith and director Antoine Fuqua use their influence to create dramatic scenes in the old Hollywood traditions. It's meant to be more accurate than funny, but it's still amazing.
Less surprising is the decision to present the liberation in a pseudo-black-and-white aesthetic. Soft shadows appeared on the faces of slaves, animal skins, grass, and victims of violence, but they seemed more deceptive than effective.
Emancipation reveals the brutality of slavery and war. No punches are pulled in this one.
By turning Peter's story into a 133-minute film, Liberation makes typical concessions to the cinematic formula. The others were worse than Peter simply because they weren't in the movie, so they were sacrificed to prove Peter's commitment.
This may have been an inevitability of having Peter as the main character, but another cliché is evident. Emancipation has a very familiar scene where a man points a gun at Peter and yells at him to shoot, but Peter reveals off camera that someone saved him.
This cliché should end with a modern movie, let alone one based on a true story.
Historians will more easily assess the validity of emancipation . As a film, it makes excellent use of the medium to present difficult subjects in a familiar format.
Fred Topple, who attended film school at Ithaca College, is a UPI entertainment writer based in Los Angeles. Professional film critic since 1999, Rotten Tomatoes critic since 2001, and a member of the Television Critics Association since 2012. Read more about his entertainment career.
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