• Remember the names of Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz. They are the co-directors and co-writers behind 2020’s horror/thriller Antebellum starring the magnificent Janelle Monáe. It is the debut film for Bush and Renz, it premiered during the pandemic so there’s virtually no box office, and the reviews are rough- so here’s hoping they get another chance.
  • the prologue is a Faulkner quote- “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”
  • the opening shot many be cinema’s single finest shot in 2020. Their camera travels underneath the Spanish moss and past Don Johnson’s house in Django Unchained. It features these beautiful lens flares, shot during the magic hour for prime photography. There are more than a dozen characters involved in the one single shot- so the choreography has to be perfect. It has this tense, dramatic score— in total the tracking shot lasts four minutes. It is like a minor version of Joe Wright’s Dunkirk shot in Atonement.
  • The very next shot is a slow-motion escape attempt. These are slaves on a plantation—horrifying.
  • Bush and Renz are swinging for the fences with both style and content. Their theme, tying the Faulkner quote to the bizarre horror story set-up, is about the generational ramifications of slavery in America (brought to shocking, and literal, situation in the film). Throughout the film characters talk about racism being “in the DNA” and dealing with the past.
  • Gorgeous Fincher yellow natural lighting under the Confederate army tent
  • Some critics clearly resented the ambitious swing—and I’d be fine with the criticism that it doesn’t all mesh. But they cannot be objecting to combination of the atrocities shown on film and the undeniable stylistic and visual beauty of the film. Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave (which is based on a true story, and less of maybe a M. Night Shyamalan set-up like Antebellum– which may be why critics loved one and not the other) is also both beautiful and horrific. McQueen’s work also has a similarly jaw-dropping, elaborate tracking shot long take -Lupita Nyong’o flagellation. Those that object to the stunning frame of the light pouring in on the character hanging in death in Antebellum—would also have to object to praising the stunning frames in Pasolini’s Salo.
  • The reoccurring airplane overhead is from Roma, but also fitting here with letting us know early on that this isn’t set in the 18th or 19th century like we may have thought at first with that opening shot surveying the atrocities of a southern plantation with Confederate soldiers.
  • Slow-motion heavy, a constant luminous full moon during the night scenes
  • The film is not perfect, some of the writing can be glib—and poor Gabourey Sidibe is done no favors with the writing for her character. Everything she tries does not work – nails on a chalkboard- but certainly the strengths of Antebellum and the admirable ambition outweigh the flaws.
  • Highly Recommend- top 10 of the year quality

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