Mark Reviews Movies: ANTEBELLUM

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Review by Mark Dujsik | September 17, 2020

There's a potentially potent idea behind the premise of Antebellum. Unfortunately, to reveal that idea and, indeed, even most of the movie's premise would bring us into that much-dreaded "spoiler" territory. That hesitation in even describing what story the movie is telling should be a telltale sign of how little effort the filmmakers have put into their central conceit. If it's revealed, the movie's purpose and impact are all but destroyed.

Make no mistake: This is a movie that's entirely about its big, third-act twist. The revelation isn't much of a surprise, mind you, and everything leading up to it certainly gives us plenty of time and opportunity to ponder most of the possible scenarios. If you haven't figured out the twist by the time it's disclosed (and then disclosed again and again throughout the final act, as if the overt reveal within the plot and the first obvious giveaway aren't enough), there's a high probability you've come up with something close enough or, perhaps, better.

The story begins on a Southern plantation during the Civil War. Directors Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz's camera wanders across the grounds, observing some civilians and Confederate soldiers going about their routines, while forced laborers work on the grounds.

The camera finally arrives at the scene of a struggle. A Black man and woman are attempting to break free from the hold of some soldiers, and in a scene of slow-motion terror, the woman's run is suddenly stopped by a lasso around her neck. She is shot and killed. The man howls in agonizing grief.

The remainder of the first act, set on the plantation, keeps repeating that single note of horrific abuse and senseless death. At the center of it is "Eden" (Janelle Monáe), a slave on the plantation whom others have looked to for an escape plan. Among those hoping for freedom are "Eli" (Tongayi Chirisa), whose wife was killed in the introduction, and "Julia" (Kiersey Clemons), a new arrival to the plantation who tells "Eden" that she is pregnant.

We watch these three endure much—verbal abuse (These racists are surprisingly, well, polite in the way they never use a certain racial epithet, and while one could argue that it makes sense within the context of the actual story being told, that's a pretty big stretch, considering everything else they do), beatings, branding, rapes. Such pain and suffering become the defining features of these characters (Their fates don't alleviate that thought). Even their capacity to talk is limited by the harsh rules of the plantation, where a general (played by Eric Lange) and Captain Jasper (Jack Huston) insist that a slave is not to speak unless spoken to first.

The screenplay, written by Bush and Renz, doesn't have any concern for these characters as people—only forms to be silently abused in order to show the horrors of slavery (The ultimate revelation brings even that goal into question). We do eventually meet "Eden"—or someone exactly like her—in the present day as Veronica (also played by Monáe), a doctor of sociology who publicly and thoughtfully discusses matters of race, gender, and class—bringing out the ire of certain political forces. The filmmaking suggests that the plantation scenes are just Veronica's nightmare, but that would be easy, wouldn't it?

Any discussion of the plot has to end there—because going further would give away too much and because there isn't much further to go in the plot before the twist. There's a lot of screen time devoted to Veronica's life and a night out with her friends, but like the scenes on the plantation, that time is only spent hitting one note: Veronica is a public and forceful voice against social inequity, and some mysterious people really don't like what she has to say (Also, she's an expert horseback rider, which seems like the least important story detail that needs to be explained for the finale to make sense).

Speaking in the broadest possible terms, the final revelation is filled with thematic potential, mainly about the prominence and longevity of racism. While the face of racism adapts to fit the social norms of the time, it ultimately and always returns to the plantation and the romanticizing of the era, as well as the wicked beliefs that are really at the foundation of that history.

It's a solid, subversive conceit (even if it does, in order to possess a "shocking" and allegorical twist, ignore the real ways that the face of racism has evolved over the centuries in this country). All of that concept's potential, though, is squandered in the final act of Antebellum, which elevates action over ideas and just leaves us wondering how the filmmakers thought their approach could possibly work.

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