First Short Quiz

[johnkarls]

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1. Did the movie version of 12 Years A Slave win the 2014 Golden Globe for Best Picture and on Jan 16, receive 9 Academy Award Nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Leading Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress?

2. Did the 1853 autobiography on which the movie is based, become famous immediately and become a center-piece of the Abolitionist Movement leading to the Civil War because it is the autobiography of a free black man who had been both a husband and father when he was kidnapped in Washington DC in 1841 and sold into slavery until he was miraculously rescued 12 years later?

3. Are both versions important in painting a realistic picture of slavery in America -- NOT the "Gone With The Wind" happy servants of friendly masters, BUT RATHER the treatment of slaves as work animals who could be (and frequently were) raped or tortured or killed at will and whose families were routinely ripped apart as children and spouses were sold to other slave masters on distant plantations?

4. In the movie version, how many incidents are shown of slaves being raped by their masters? Of slaves being killed when they tried to defend fellow slaves from being raped? Of slaves being whipped until their backs were bloody pulps? Of slaves having their children ripped from them and sold to owners of distant plantations? Of slaves being subjected to sadism, both physical and mental? Of slaves being routinely whipped at the end of every day they failed to pick enough cotton?

5. In the movie version shown at the Megaplex/Sandy on 11/19/2013, Solomon Northrup's slave owner is shown coming out to the field and dragging off one of the female slaves to a nearby shack to be raped and, when her slave husband objects, he is summarily shot dead in front of her and their slave child -- but in the movie version shown at the Broadway Theatre on 1/16/2014, this scene is omitted -- why is the Broadway Theatre showing an expurgated version?

6. Does the movie version open with one of the other free black men kidnapped in Washington DC and then thrown together with Solomon Northrup, proposing a violent rebellion?

7. Was the rebellious victim any more successful than John Brown or Spartacus?

8. Does Brad Pitt play a pivotal role (though not the leading role) in the movie, in addition to being listed as the lead producer?

9. Does Brad Pitt deliver a sermon to Solomon Northrup's third slave owner about the religious hypocrisy of the slave owner?

10. Were all of the slave owners (including their spouses) portrayed as Christian hypocrites?

11. Is the utter agony of Solomon Northrup and his fellow slaves shown when they sing "Roll, Jordan, Roll" as they bury one of their fellow slaves who had died suddenly in the hot sun as they were picking cotton?

12. Why do you think that American slaves remained Christian rather than, like a significant percentage of modern-day African Americans such as Muhammad Ali, converting to Islam?

13. Do polls routinely show that virtually all Americans believe in God but a majority now say they do not attend religious services because of the hypocrisy of those who do attend?

14. Are virtually all of the world's religions, including Christianity, based on The Golden Rule (do unto others as you would have them do unto you)?

15. Is the hypocrisy that is reported in the polls a perception that religious practitioners fail/refuse to follow The Golden Rule?

16. Is this the reason why Pope Francis recently announced that "who am I" to judge homosexuals (while turning a blind eye to the issues of birth control and abortion vis-à-vis which Roman Catholic Doctrine permits him no leeway) -- and emphasizing instead on 11/24/2013 in a 224-page "Exhortation" (which is generally credited with clinching his being selected Time Magazine's "Person of the Year" a few weeks later) focusing on The Golden Rule and how that means, inter alia, economic equality despite the ensuing howls of protest from wealthy Catholics?

17. Wouldn't it have been nice in the 12 Years A Slave scene in which Brad Pitt is delivering his sermon to the slave owner about his Christian Hypocrisy if Pope Francis could have arrived in a time capsule just in the nick of time to support Brad Pitt?

18. Looking through the time telescope the other way (if that is not mixing metaphors too badly), isn’t Brad Pitt obviously relishing on screen the delivery of his sermon to Simon Northrup’s third slave owner so much that one is forced to conclude that the only reason why he did the movie version of 12 Years is that he really wanted the opportunity to deliver that sermon (Christian hypocrisy) TO MODERN-DAY AMERICA???

19. And that instead of “12 Years A Slave,” Brad Pitt’s movie version would more appropriately have been entitled: “Brad Pitt’s Sermon To Modern-Day America On Christian Hypocrisy Cleverly Disguised As A Sermon To Ante-Bellum American Slave Owners On Their Christian Hypocrisy”???

20. And that Brad Pitt and Pope Francis are really kindred spirits???

21. And that, forget about Oscars, Pope Francis should be succeeded as Time Magazine’s 2013 Person of the Year for his humanity in trying to bring The World to its senses, by Time Magazine’s selecting Brad Pitt next December as its 2014 Person of the Year for his valiant attempt to bring America to its senses???