Belle

Drink: English Ale

Entree: Fish & Chips

Dessert: Trifle

Movie:

Belle is a story that is hidden within history because it is not often told.  Before watching the film I suggest taking a look at the above painting.  On the left is Dido Elizabeth Belle & to the right is her cousin Lady Elizabeth Murray.  It literally makes you wonder...

• Who were these two women?
• Why were they posing for the same portrait?
• What is behind Belle's mischievous smile?
• Cousins?  

In order to answer these questions we must first look at how Belle arrived to this situation. Belle's mother was an enslaved woman in the West Indies & her father a British Royal Navy officer.  After her mother died she was discovered by her father living in poverty.  He then made arrangements to send her to England to be raised as a free woman by his uncle.

In the home in which she was raised Belle was educated and well dressed but not allowed to eat at the same table during dinner parties.  Regardless, of how her new family felt about her they gave into society's racist culture. As a result, as the film continues we see her realize that she was not fully accepted as an equal.

Another subplot that came into the foreground was that of the trial regarding the Zong slave ship.  The questions at hand during the trial were...

• Did the slave traders throw the slaves overboard because they were sick and therefore could not render them a profit?

OR

• Did the slaves drown of their own accord when the ship was struck by a violent storm at sea?

What tied this all together was the fact that Belle's uncle was the Lord Chief of Justice that resided over the case.  Also in the background Belle falls in love with a liberal lawyer that was attending the trial and informed her of it's ongoings.

As for the film itself it does have some cheesy points for such serious topics.  With that said, overall it's not terrible it just needs more of a dramatic sharp edge to match the strict contrasts of society at this point in time.

Mel's Rating: 73%

On a scale of 100.

Brett's Rating: ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️

On a scale of 10.