Today’s Movie Trailer: 12 Years a Slave

The based-on-a-true-story saga will arrive in theaters in December

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It might just be a coincidence, but the debut of this new trailer for 12 Years a Slave comes at an appropriate time: this Saturday, as the third Saturday in July, is Solomon Northup Day in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.

Northup was a resident of the area in the early 19th century, a free black man who worked at hotels in the area. In 1841, he was kidnapped and sold into slavery. He lived as a slave for—as you may have guessed—a dozen years. In 1853, shortly after he regained his freedom, he published a memoir called Twelve Years a Slave.

(MOREThe Emancipation Proclamation, 150 Years Later)

In the forthcoming movie version of his ordeal, British actor Chiwetel Ejiofor stars as Northup, alongside an impressive supporting cast that includes Brad Pitt, Benedict Cumberbatch, Michael Fassbender, Paul Giamatti, Sarah Paulson and Quvenzhané Wallis. The movie is due in theaters Dec. 26, 2013.

It might just be a coincidence, but the debut of this new trailer for 12 Years a Slave comes at an appropriate time: this Saturday, as the third Saturday in July, is Solomon Northup Day in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.

Northup was a resident of the area in the early 19th century, a free black man who worked at hotels in the area. In 1841, he was kidnapped and sold into slavery. He lived as a slave for—as you may have guessed—a dozen years. In 1853, shortly after he regained his freedom, he published a memoir called Twelve Years a Slave.

(MOREThe Emancipation Proclamation, 150 Years Later)

In the forthcoming movie version of his ordeal, British actor Chiwetel Ejiofor stars as Northup, alongside an impressive supporting cast that includes Brad Pitt, Benedict Cumberbatch, Michael Fassbender, Paul Giamatti, Sarah Paulson and Quvenzhané Wallis. The movie is due in theaters Dec. 26, 2013.