In spite of her extraordinary actions, Harriet Tubman is not a name UK audiences will be all too familiar with; while discussions wage on across the pond about placing Tubman on a banknote, the mentions of her in our history books are few and far between. A pivotal figure in the fight for the abolition of slavery in the United States, Tubman's life is the focus of Kasi Lemmons' Harriet, starring rising screen star Cynthia Eviro as the slave-turned-abolitionist.
After escaping imprisonment as a slave to a farm-owning family in the mid-1800s, "Minty" claims the name Harriet Tubman and dedicates her life to fighting for the freedom of her people. Armed with the gift of witnessing flashes from her future, Harriet's visions help lead hundreds to freedom via the underground railroad.
An inspirational true story does not a good film make, and Harriet is a very bland and lacklustre biopic for a woman who was anything but. In attempting to remain universally crowd-pleasing, director Kasi Lemmons barely scratches the surface of the remarkable life its titular inspiration led, undermining her genuine bravery and valour with a studio polish to ensure it remains digestible by the mainstream. An extensive runtime but rushed editing are at odds with one another, resulting in an overbloated and lethargic picture that unfurls with little in the way of excitement. Terence Blanchard's score is solid in isolation but its incorporation in the feature is heavy-handed, overbearing in its usage; the same goes for John Toll's cinematography, which frames the film nicely but conflicts with its tone and narrative.
At its core though, Gregory Allen Howard and Lemmons' screenplay is where most of the faults manifest. From a storytelling perspective, it's a mess: by consistently and predictably using her "visions" as a framing device, the film paints Harriet as invincible, almost like a superhero. But in doing this, the film's dramatic edge is gone; there's no sense of intensity or immediate danger, Harriet's survival never in any jeopardy; in an era for people of colour where tomorrow was never guaranteed, it's an utterly bizarre decision that underwrites the absolute peril of her actions at the time.
As soon as Harriet has escaped captivity and obtained freedom, the film jumps ahead a year; skipping over such a crucial segment of her “journey” really unsteadies the character development - the Harriet we see just before this time jump is no different than the Harriet the film closes on, with the cut that takes her from scared slave to liberating legend reducing the on-screen arc to that of very little weight or sustenance.
Furthermore, the confounding decision to entirely fabricate a black bounty hunter (literally named Bigger Long, a pervasive Mandingo stereotype that the writers should surely know better than to stoke) on a mission to kill Harriet reeks of storytelling for white audiences, going out of its way to mollycoddle certain demographics and stress that, yes, there are good and bad people on both sides! Where do I recognise that rhetoric?
Films are, of course, entitled to artistic license but straying so far from fact into falsehood is a glaring misrepresentation that dangerously presents a black man as the biggest villain in a story that features many white slave owners and ruthless oppressors. To undermine this incredible true story is bad enough but to outright lie in a way that villainises one of their own for the sake of a more stomachable moviegoing experience is an insidious decision that, worryingly, might go unnoticed by audiences unfamiliar with Harriet's story.
Cynthia Eviro, one of last year's breakout stars with her back-to-back brilliance in Widows and Bad Times At The El Royale, does as well as she can with the material she has. Harriet's lack of development over the majority of the film limits Eviro, and whenever the script grants her a moment to shine, it falls into biopic trappings that not even the best performer could escape. It's a crying shame because a Harriet Tubman biopic has been long overdue, and it's a solid piece of casting - but the material could not be more disappointing.
A bad script is all it takes for a biopic to trip up and Harriet's writing sets it on a downward slope from the word go - although the rather unremarkable direction does little to try and salvage it. Even Cynthia Eviro's performance ends up underwhelming on the basis of poorly-realised character development, with the perplexing decision to skip over a most crucial period in her story sinking it with over an hour still to go. Perhaps the most frustrating misfire of the year, Harriet spends too long trying to please the masses, diluting the potency of her story in the meantime. She really deserved better than this.
4/10
Summary: A woman as inspiration and influential as Harriet Tubman deserves to be honoured for her contribution to the world and fight for equality better than with such a bland, conventional and poorly-judged biopic.
After escaping imprisonment as a slave to a farm-owning family in the mid-1800s, "Minty" claims the name Harriet Tubman and dedicates her life to fighting for the freedom of her people. Armed with the gift of witnessing flashes from her future, Harriet's visions help lead hundreds to freedom via the underground railroad.
An inspirational true story does not a good film make, and Harriet is a very bland and lacklustre biopic for a woman who was anything but. In attempting to remain universally crowd-pleasing, director Kasi Lemmons barely scratches the surface of the remarkable life its titular inspiration led, undermining her genuine bravery and valour with a studio polish to ensure it remains digestible by the mainstream. An extensive runtime but rushed editing are at odds with one another, resulting in an overbloated and lethargic picture that unfurls with little in the way of excitement. Terence Blanchard's score is solid in isolation but its incorporation in the feature is heavy-handed, overbearing in its usage; the same goes for John Toll's cinematography, which frames the film nicely but conflicts with its tone and narrative.
At its core though, Gregory Allen Howard and Lemmons' screenplay is where most of the faults manifest. From a storytelling perspective, it's a mess: by consistently and predictably using her "visions" as a framing device, the film paints Harriet as invincible, almost like a superhero. But in doing this, the film's dramatic edge is gone; there's no sense of intensity or immediate danger, Harriet's survival never in any jeopardy; in an era for people of colour where tomorrow was never guaranteed, it's an utterly bizarre decision that underwrites the absolute peril of her actions at the time.
As soon as Harriet has escaped captivity and obtained freedom, the film jumps ahead a year; skipping over such a crucial segment of her “journey” really unsteadies the character development - the Harriet we see just before this time jump is no different than the Harriet the film closes on, with the cut that takes her from scared slave to liberating legend reducing the on-screen arc to that of very little weight or sustenance.
Furthermore, the confounding decision to entirely fabricate a black bounty hunter (literally named Bigger Long, a pervasive Mandingo stereotype that the writers should surely know better than to stoke) on a mission to kill Harriet reeks of storytelling for white audiences, going out of its way to mollycoddle certain demographics and stress that, yes, there are good and bad people on both sides! Where do I recognise that rhetoric?
Films are, of course, entitled to artistic license but straying so far from fact into falsehood is a glaring misrepresentation that dangerously presents a black man as the biggest villain in a story that features many white slave owners and ruthless oppressors. To undermine this incredible true story is bad enough but to outright lie in a way that villainises one of their own for the sake of a more stomachable moviegoing experience is an insidious decision that, worryingly, might go unnoticed by audiences unfamiliar with Harriet's story.
Cynthia Eviro, one of last year's breakout stars with her back-to-back brilliance in Widows and Bad Times At The El Royale, does as well as she can with the material she has. Harriet's lack of development over the majority of the film limits Eviro, and whenever the script grants her a moment to shine, it falls into biopic trappings that not even the best performer could escape. It's a crying shame because a Harriet Tubman biopic has been long overdue, and it's a solid piece of casting - but the material could not be more disappointing.
A bad script is all it takes for a biopic to trip up and Harriet's writing sets it on a downward slope from the word go - although the rather unremarkable direction does little to try and salvage it. Even Cynthia Eviro's performance ends up underwhelming on the basis of poorly-realised character development, with the perplexing decision to skip over a most crucial period in her story sinking it with over an hour still to go. Perhaps the most frustrating misfire of the year, Harriet spends too long trying to please the masses, diluting the potency of her story in the meantime. She really deserved better than this.
4/10
Summary: A woman as inspiration and influential as Harriet Tubman deserves to be honoured for her contribution to the world and fight for equality better than with such a bland, conventional and poorly-judged biopic.