2006-12-14 17:07:19 · 5 answers · asked by ksusha143 1 in Entertainment & Music ➔ Movies
interestingly enough, almost everyone knows about the "Dred Scott" case in the 1850's...
This case, in 1839, was the blue print for the question of "slaves as property" until that landmark case...
In 1839, a Spanish slave ship called the Amistad was carrying 53 slaves from Havana, Cuba to another Cuban port...
Under the leadership of a slave named Cinque, these slaves mutinied and killed the captain and the crew. Not knowing how to navigate, they spared one white man to help them. This white man steered them north in a very stealthy way, and they ended up in Long Island, and were picked up by a US Warship, and placed within the charge of the federal marshal.
The question was: were these slaves "property" that Spain could prosecute as pirates and murderers? Or were these "slaves" wrongfully "imprisoned", with their actions of "piracy and murder" understandable consequences of enslavement?
The US Supreme Court ruled, after a closing argument remarkably eloquent by the former president John Quincy Adams, that mankind had a natural right to freedom because true Slave Trade was illegal by law for both Spain and the Americas, and the Court set Cinque and his friends free. They were returned to Africa...
(Slave OWNERSHIP was another issue entirely...as the Dred Scott case would attest, and the Civil War would resolve)
But the movie is worth watching if nothing else than for the speech given by Anthony Hopkins as JQA...
In a moment of fantastic drama, Hopkins holds a pamphlet in his hand as if it were the Declaration of Independence, and speaks about the "truths that are self-evident...that all men are created equal". He then proclaims that if that were not true in that court at that moment, black or white, then he had a subtle suggestion as to "what to do with that document"...(The Declaration of Independence)
And he proceeds to rip the pamphlet in half as if it were the Declaration...and laid it on the table of the procecutor...
In an even more interesting gesture, Hopkins as JQA then pats the shoulder of the procesutor as if to say..."I understand your argument...but now you must finally see at long last that I am right"...and the reaction of the prosecutor (Pete Postlethwaite) intimates that he agrees with Anthony Hopkins...
A moment worth the entire film...
2006-12-14 17:24:05 · answer #1 · answered by Christopher H G 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I havent seen it, but its about: AMISTAD is about a 1839 mutiny aboard a slave ship that is traveling towards the Northeast Coast of America. Much of the story involves a court-room drama about the free-man who led the revolt.
Check the reviews and forums here to find some opinions: http://imdb.com/title/tt0118607/
2006-12-14 17:11:36 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
The action picture Amistad is approximately attractive females full of lust that sought for men in each and all of the corners of the international, yet no longer looking any, they had to have intercourse with monkeys and koalas.
2016-10-14 23:46:51 · answer #3 · answered by schwalm 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
A movie about Slavery
--- It depicts the abuse the African slaves incurred while on the Middle Passage from Africa to America
Good Movie---directed by Steven Spielberg---Would've gotten Best Picture were it not for Titanic
2006-12-14 17:10:20 · answer #4 · answered by What gives? 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I know it's about slavery & I watched it the day it came out, but can't remember the whole plot. All I remember is it was a touching story & the main slave said " Give Us us Free" cause he couldn't speak English. All in all I remember liking it.
2006-12-14 17:12:23 · answer #5 · answered by Island Princess 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋