Based on the true story of Dido Elizabeth Belle (Gugu Mabatha-Raw), Belle is a British period drama set at the end of the 1700s. But Belle is a lady like no other, as she is not only an illegitimate child but also mixed raced; her father, John Lindsay (Matthew Goode), is a white British admiral, but little is known of the mother, who we are led to believe is a black slave.
When, aged 10, Belle’s mother dies, her father leaves her in the care of her aristocratic aunt (Emily Watson) and her uncle Lord Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson), who happens to be the Lord Chief Justice overseeing the final verdict on the Zong case, the horrific drowning of 142 slaves by a mercenary shipping company. Lord Mansfield’s ruling on this infamous case became an important step in bringing an end to slavery in England.
Surprisingly (or, sadly, unsurprising in those days), the trial wasn’t about the murder of these people, but an attempt by the captain to claim insurance money on their lives, as he insisted that their deaths were inevitable, pretending that the ship had ran out of water. At the time, the Empire’s economy depended on the slave trade and it was an accepted part of British life. In Georgian Britain, in fact, there were about 15,000 black people; only 30% of those were free from slavery.
Mixed raced Belle, on the other hand, grew up in Kenwood House in Hampstead, causing a stir amongst aristocratic social circles. She was raised almost as an equal to her cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray (Sarah Gadon). The film, in fact, is inspired by the 1779 painting of the two girls appearing on the same eye line.
Little is known of the real Dido Elizabeth Belle’s daily life; in the film, however, her lineage affords her certain privileges. At times, the color of her skin prevents her from fully participating in the traditions of her social standing. Belle seems resigned to accept her strange place, where she is “Too high in rank to dine with the servants, but too low to dine with the family” when entertaining guests. It is ironic that, when she sets her eyes on the local vicar’s son, her uncle Lord Mansfield finds him beneath her and therefore not worthy of her hand.
As period dramas go, Belle is just as beautifully written and directed as many classics. Raising awareness of issues faced by bi racial people, however, makes it unique. And there was certainly no better way to capture a period drama where skin colour is such an important issue than with 4k resolution. Belle is in fact the first major British film shot on Sony’s F65 CineAlta digital camera, where its ultra-high definition images are a perfect way to showcase the warmth of skin shades and the movie’s spectacular costumes and settings.
Belle is an elegant and tasteful film, passionately directed by British black director Amma Asante, who leads us into a rarely explored subject through the beautifully expressive eyes of Gugu Mabatha-Raw. Her character is witty and almost too outspoken for a lady of such epoch, whether she is discussing race issues or dispensing dating advice to her cousin. It feels way too modern for Belle to have actually lived in corseted Georgian society, and maybe that is the point. Because her mere existence may have in fact shaken its people to the core and, whether fact or fiction, we love to think that Belle, the stunning product of love between two such different worlds, may have actually influenced the end of slavery.
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