[Amanpour:] Welcome back to the program. It is awards season for the movies and "Vanity Fair" magazine's annual Hollywood issue has the stars splashed across its cover. The Oscars will be handed out next month and here in Britain, the BAFTAs will be awarded next week. This year's Best Picture nominees focused on a number of real-life issues that we often cover on this program, whether some of the Catholic Church's most shameful history, like forced adoptions highlighted by the film, "Philomena," or Somali pirates on the high seas in "Captain Phillips," all the way now to the most celebrated and nomination film this year, "12 Years a Slave." It's about the absolute horrors of slavery in the United States. It's a story of a free black man from the North who's kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. The film is powerful and at times it is hard to watch, as its main character, played by Oscar nominated Chiwetel Ejiofor suffers through brutal physical and emotional abuse.
[Solomon Northup":] Days ago I was with my family, in my home. Now you're telling me all is lost? Tell no one who I am, that's the way to survive? Well, I don't want to survive. I want to live.
[Amanpour:] The film's British director, Steve McQueen, is also nominated and if he wins, he'll be the first-ever black director to take home the prestigious golden statue. And Steve McQueen joins me now from Los Angeles. Welcome. Thank you for joining me and just to say, this is obviously the most incredible film and so rightly nominated for so many awards. What was it that made you focus on this subject of all subjects?
[Steve Mcqueen, Film Director:] Well, for me, being of African descent, I thought there was a hole in the canon of cinema with regarding this subject. And I wanted to sort of delve in that narrative. I wanted to investigate a narrative. So it was just for me, it was very natural that I wanted to put it on film.
[Amanpour:] And how emotional was it for you? I mean, I know that you had to or you did film in like 108 degrees in the South. There was, you know, sort of sort of shadows and relics of the slave era still there. At one point you said it was a little bit like dancing with ghosts. What was the filming of this like?
[Mcqueen:] Well, we had an amazing crew from the catering to the hair and makeup, the camera department. So as a family of filmmakers, we were we were so sort of united and wanted to make this film work. Yes, the blistering heat and also the emotion, of course, of certain scenes. But without that kind of foundation of these sort of great filmmakers who came together to make this movie, it wouldn't have got done. So it was about us, not as individuals, but us as a group. And there was so much love, there was so much honor that we were making this film on Solomon Northup's book.
[Amanpour:] Of course, you know, the story, it's a true story. I believe you said your wife actually found the book when you were casting around for the right story to tell. You know, it is unflinching; you are unflinching. Your camera hangs on some of the most brutal scenes. And obviously some people have criticized you for that. But I'm wondering, you know, for instance, tell me what took you through getting the main character, the slave, Solomon, to beat the woman rather than the master beating the woman. It was incredibly powerful to see a black man beating a black woman.
[Mcqueen:] I mean, for me, either we were going to tell the a story of slavery or we weren't. And I decided that we were going to tell the story about slavery. And with all what occurs within slavery, you know, physical and mental torture. But at the same time, there was, you know, there was a love in that situation. It's odd to say, but there is. But that's the reason why I'm here. I'm still here because within that sort of environment of if you want to say hostile terror, there was this thing of love. People wanted their children to survive within that and nurture. And the whole idea of course, when you talk about what was written in Solomon's book about him taking the whip to Patsey, who's his friend, but it's one of the things where all those aspects have to be looked at and investigated in order for us to sort of heal, in order for us to sort of understand where we come from and where we want to go in the future.
[Amanpour:] Well, I want to ask you because you lead Yes, and you lead me to obviously a natural question, you say that you were beaten as a child; your parents were beaten, this sort of violence has sort of been passed down. And there but for the grace of God, you could have been or maybe your ancestors were slaves.
[Mcqueen:] Well, my ancestors were slaves. My parents are from the West Indies, from Grenada. Yes, and you know, again, it's to do with a sort of slave mentality and what's happened. And that's what I wanted to investigate in this film. There's so many things which people often question, but we don't seem to want to answer. And I wanted this film to try and answer some of those questions. So it was very important for me to make this picture. In fact, it was vital.
[Amanpour:] At one point you said the question really is why hasn't this picture been made before, that there is a deafening silence over the remnants of slavery that still exist all around us every day, whether it's the prison population. Tell me how you look at the reality of life for blacks, for African- Americans today?
[Mcqueen:] Well, I think there's a huge strength within the African-American community and as well as the African community, West African community in Britain and elsewhere in the world in Europe. There's a huge strength because we're survivors. And we're survivors through love. And I think what's been interesting for me about this film is the amount of people who have wanted to see this movie. We've made over $100 million on this on this picture so far. So it just tells you that people are interested in stories, interested in challenging stories and wanting to sort of somehow reflect on that past, more than they ever have before. So it's been a it's kind of been a kind of beautiful experience, really.
[Amanpour:] Now when it comes to the future, your next projects, the BBC has announced that you will be doing a project together about blacks in Britain. And I heard today that you said you want your next project to be a musical. Are you looking for something completely different?
[Mcqueen:] Well, I think all my movies
[Amanpour:] And are you excited for the BAFTAs, for the Oscars? Is your heart in your stomach on somewhere?
[Mcqueen:] Yes, I'm excited. You know, again, it's just about we've got nine nominations. And it's just that's the most important thing to me, that my crew had been nominated and the film's been recognized in this way, because we were at a point where, you know, some person said I remember very early on a very impossible movie. So the fact that we've made the impossible possible, that has given me a lot of satisfaction.
[Amanpour:] Well, Steve McQueen, we'll be watching. Thank you very much indeed for joining me.
[Mcqueen:] Thank you so much.
[Amanpour:] And 80 years ago, the Motion Picture Academy bestowed a special Oscar on a 6-year-old girl with curly hair and a phenomenal ability to sing and dance her way into people's hearts, even in the darkest days of the Great Depression. [Begin Video Clip, "the Little Colonel") Amanpour And when she took the hand of song-and-dance man Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, walking up the staircase, America's view of race would never quite be the same. Remembering Shirley Temple when we come back. [END VIDEO CLIP, "THE LITTLE COLONEL"]