Our Flick of the Week is Steven Spielberg’s 19th Century slavery drama “Amistad,” which manages to tell a most complicated court case story with uncommon passion. Whether African men sold into slavery who then murdered some of their captors aboard a vessel bound for Cuba can be legitimately tried for the killings is the central judicial concept explored in “Amistad.”
Of course, writ large is the issue whether human beings should ever be considered as property, and it is this issue that divides the United States in 1839, as the Amistad rebellion takes place. The case ascends to the U.S. Supreme Court, where former President John Quincy Adams (Anthony Hopkins in yet another fine character turn) argues the anti-slavery position along with young attorney Roger Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey). If you plan on taking young people to see this R-rated movie — and I think it’s a good idea — may I recommend you brief them on some of these legal issues. A little preparation will have a big payoff.
As for the African characters, Spielberg and his writers succeed in giving some of them distinct personalities, including their leader Cinque (Djimon Hounsou). They are not an undifferentiated mass.
Spielberg also creates an indelible image of slavery in the form of a long, thick nail — the equivalent of the candle in his “Schindler’s List.”
Other significant contributions to our understanding of the mechanics of slavery are the film’s images of Africans throwing their brothers in nets and the sight of the captives being taken to a monstrous slave prison facility in Africa before being loaded onto ships. Spielberg nails down the commerce of slavery in all its sordid details. Rated R. (star) (star) (star) 1/2
– FOR RICHER OR POORER. A comedy that works only in its third act, when it stops trying to be funny and becomes emotional. Tim Allen and Kirstie Alley play a wealthy, feuding New York couple in trouble with the IRS who hide out in an Amish community. Lame jokes about the Amish abound until there is a clear shift of tone late in the picture when the New Yorkers begin to appreciate the spirit of hard work, selflessness and co-operation that fuels Amish activities. The result is a film that is only marginally successful. PG-13. (star) (star) 1/2
– HOME ALONE 3. A tiresome parade of slapstick stunts in which a couple of crooks are repeatedly bonked on the head by assorted falling objects. That, of course, also was a comic motif in the original film in this now-desperate series, but this time it’s more than a motif — it’s the movie. Cute Macaulay Culkin has been replaced by a generic moptop (Alex D. Linz), who combats four thieves trying to capture a stolen military computer chip that has found its way into his possession. It’s all very tiresome. PG. (star)
– SCREAM 2. A surprisingly well-written sequel — for me, more entertaining than the original — in which a gaggle of college kids combat the slasher among them. Like the smash hit original, this script by Kevin Williamson has a lot of fun with the conventions of the horror genre. But this time around, the relationships are tighter and the topical references are brighter. Yes, it’s a slasher film, but a funny and tense one to be sure. R. (star) (star) (star)
– = New this week