Throughout it all, Barry Jenkins’s camera makes slow pilgrimages from one end of a given scene to the next, like it too has been enlisted in Ridgeway’s grim procession. The ruined vistas it captures are stunning in their own bleak way. The camera also captures some characters looking directly at us, like Cora when she speaks aloud to her absent mother and Lovey and Caesar, or Ridgeway Senior when he glares at (presumably) his detestable son in the vision Cora conjures of their eventual pointless reunion. It is hard to meet their gaze.
I reviewed episode 5 of The Underground Railroad for Decider.
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