Amistad Historical Movies Find Themselves

Amistad

Historical movies find themselves in a precarious situation; they strive for historical accuracy while creating an entertaining film that viewers and critics will enjoy. In this regard, Amistad is no different from any other historical movie. It takes dramatic liberties for entertainment value in order for the audience (the American moviegoer) to be able to relate with the movie. These liberties are not necessarily detrimental, as they capture the emotions that the Africans must have felt throughout their ordeal. The beginning scenes abroad La Amistad displayed the horrors and brutality of the "Middle Passage" and the Atlantic Slave trade. However, there are other scenes in the film that sole purpose is to evoke an emotion from the viewer, such as Cinque's now famous line "Give us free." Another moment was John Quincy Adam and Cinque's interaction in the greenhouse. Cinque reacts to a West African flower which convinces Mr. Adams to defend their case in the Supreme Court. On the other hand, there are several anachronisms found throughout the movie.

The movie's consistent hint or reference to a Civil war is a major anachronism of the movie. Throughout the movie ordinary citizens discuss the upcoming Civil War, an event that does not occur for another twenty years. Also, the movie depicts President Van Buren's feelings toward the case being influenced by his re-election campaign and trying to appease the South so he can garner votes. At the end of the movie, Van Buren loses his re-election campaign due to the freedom of the Amistad prisoners. This is a simplification of history.

While the film has its fair share of accurate events, such as the mutiny abroad the ship, Spanish pressure to return the Africans to Spain, the actual trial in Connecticut and the Supreme Court, it fails in accurately portraying the importance of the case. According to the movie, the case was important in helping to start the American Civil War. At one point in the movie Senator Calhoun warns if the Amistad Africans are freed, then the South will have little choice but to go to war to defend its economic interests, in other words, slavery. This is simply not the case, the Amistad case was centered on the Atlantic slave trade which was already outlawed. Spain was breaking international law by transporting kidnapped Africans as slaves to Cuba and its other colonies. The notion that the Africans were tortured and kidnapped as free persons validated their use of force to free themselves from the Spanish. The freedom of the Africans did not endanger America's stability because domestic laws were never even in question. The Spanish slave traders violated International Law and it was this violation that freed them at the end. The movie unsuccessfully tries to link the case with the Civil War.