War and Slavery

While watching the 87th Academy Awards a couple of weeks back, there were several references to the big winner of last year’s Academy Awards, ‘12 Years a Slave’. Up until now, I hadn’t seen the movie before. So after hearing all the glowing references in this year’s Oscars. The film delved into the many disturbing practices and issues on slavery in the 1800s.

Despite the discomfiting feeling the movie left behind, the story continued to stay with me. So I tracked down the original book the movie was based on. I was amazed to find that all the disturbing scenes in the movie stayed largely true to form as the original book. It’s definitely worth reading.

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I recently re-watched one of my favourite old classic films: ‘Gone With The Wind’. I thought it interesting how differently the world of slavery is portrayed in this film. Such a contrast of ugliness and beauty of human nature.

So read the book. And watch the films. And come to talk to me about them sometime.