Has Hollywood Come to Grips with American Slavery?

Last year, Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained graphically depicted the brutality of American slavery, but almost in comic book form. Now comes, 12 Years a Slave, based on the autobiography of a free black man who was tricked into servitude. Has Hollywood caught up with history? Brenda Stevenson, Professor of History at UCLA and author of The Contested Murder of Latasha Harlins, is a student of family life of slaves in the South. Salamishah Tillet, Associate Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, is author of Sites of Slavery.