Twelve Years a Slave (some thoughts).

[fjm]

As by the time I joined LJ I was no longer teaching American history, most of you probably don't know that I taught African American history (17th through the end of the 20th century) for almost a decade. My specialist period was 1880 to 1950 (the civil rights era everyone has forgotten) but I studied US and Carribbean slavery as an undergrad and

Comments

[woolymonkey]

Interesting. Thank you. American history is not at all my area but what you say about the gap between narrative and everyday detail rings true for the times and places I know more about. I'll be more aware of those issues now when I see the film.

[ivory_goddess]

The hunger thing - casting older would be simple enough, but not feeding people until the end of each day may well contravene certain regulations! It's a similar thing to the issue of cab horses in Victorian period dramas always looking far too healthy - there are some things you can't simulate well with modern laws in place. It's one thing for a method actor to gain or lose weight for a role, it's entirely another thing to ask practically the entire cast to go on a crash diet prior to shooting.

The wearing of shoes may be for a similar reason - yes, one's feet will harden after a while if permanently barefoot, but the actors aren't taking a couple of months to adapt and it only takes one main actor (or extra) stepping on something and contracting tetanus to create some bad publicity and/or insurance problems. The teeth, however, can be simulated with make-up or dentures so there's not much excuse there (except not thinking of it).

[nancylebov]

I expect CGI will eventually be able to more or less cover most of those problems.

[fjm]

I think you could do the crash dieting for actors, they do it all the time (many Civil War re-eancters do it every year to fit into the uniforms). But you are right about the shoes.

I did find myself thinking that tetanus cannot have been that common for whipping (as opposed to "dry" flogging) to have been used so casually in the US.

[ivory_goddess]

Maybe tetanus is less common in certain types of soil (moisture content, temperature or ph-related)? Anyway, is a whip likely to be contaminated with tetanus? It's not like jabbing oneself with a garden implement or thorn.