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Laramie Movie Scope:
Free State of Jones

Interesting movie about a fascinating man

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by Robert Roten, Film Critic
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July 6, 2016 -- Since this movie was not playing in Laramie, I drove over to Cheyenne to see it, because it probably won't be in theaters very long. This kind of historical drama isn't popular, it seems. Too bad. The history this movie depicts is fascinating.

I was intrigued by this story from the time I saw the first trailer for this movie. I had never heard of Newton Knight, nor the rebellion he led against the Confederate States of America in Jones County, Mississippi during the Civil War. Before I saw the movie, I read the Wikipedia article about Newton Knight and watched an earlier movie (“Tap Roots” 1948) very loosely based on this same Jones County history. I had also read Charles Blow's New York Times op-ed column which is very critical of the racial stereotypes shown in movie.

This movie is directed by Gary Ross (“Seabiscuit”) who was very interested in the history behind the story, according to an article called “The True Story of the 'Free State of Jones'” in the Smithsonian magazine by Richard Grant. Among other things, this article mentions that descendants of Newton Knight, and others from Jones County, appeared in the film because Ross earnestly sought them out.

The time line of the movie is split between the Civil War and Reconstruction era, and a related miscegenation trial in 1948. At one point in the movie, I got mental whiplash as the story switched rapidly 85 years forwards and backwards in time. If this was a typical Hollywood movie, and it isn't, it would have ended around the time of the end of the Civil War, and it would have looked as though Newton Knight and his family lived happily ever after, but that's not how it ends. In a sense, this story never ends, because racism never ended, and segregationists are still with us.

The story in the movie starts during the Civil War, when Newton Knight (played by Matthew McConaughey of “Interstellar”) who had volunteered to fight on the side of the Confederacy, becomes a deserter after a tragic loss in battle. He and other soldiers are angry over the “Twenty Negro Law” which enabled slave owners with more than 20 slaves to legally avoid service in the Confederate Army. Jones County had relatively few slave owners, so Jones County residents overwhelmingly voted against secession even before the war started.

Jones County became a hotbed of resistance to the Confederacy, especially after harsh “taxation in kind” and conscription laws were imposed which took both food and young working men from their families who were struggling to grow enough to survive. These laws were passed to support the war effort, but they became misused by corrupt soldiers and officials.

As the number of army deserters increased, Knight became the leader of the resistance, defending farms and raiding Confederate supplies to arm and feed resistance fighters and farmers alike. Knight and his fellow rebels fought battles against Confederate troops, hiding in the swamps along the Leaf River to avoid capture. At one time the rebels held a large territory.

After the war, the film shows Knight and others, including former slave Moses Washington (played by Mahershala Ali of “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay”) trying to vote and to register other former slaves to vote. As Union troops left the south and the Union no longer had the political will to enforce voting rights laws, local and state officials restricted voting rights for black people (this has been happening continuously ever since that time).

This third act of the film is what makes it relevant today, with the court decisions weakening voting rights laws and people being disenfranchised by bogus voter identification restrictions. Unfortunately, this part of the film is at dramatic odds with the more action-oriented part of the film that precedes it. This almost seems like two films. The first part of the film is about a rebellion against the Confederate government and its army. The second part of the film is about the gradual loss of civil rights for an entire people because of a failure of political will.

There is no doubt that Newton Knight and his family and the Free State of Jones are fascinating subjects, and this film depicts all this with the best of intentions, but the construction of the story has some real problems. It tries to forge a single story out of very different story elements, those of Newton Knight and his family, the Free State of Jones, the Reconstruction era, and the story of Knght's descendant in 1948. It's a patchwork.

If you are interested in this fascinating, and little known history. This is a film worth seeing because there is a lot of fascinating history in it, still relevant today. I give Gary Ross a lot of credit for doing a lot of research and being so dedicated to bringing this story to the screen. This film is a good history lesson, but as a screen drama, it doesn't quite work. This film rates a C.

Click here for links to places to buy or rent this movie in digital formats, or to buy the soundtrack, posters, books, even used videos, games, electronics and lots of other stuff. I suggest you shop at least two of these places before buying anything. Prices seem to vary continuously. For more information on this film, click on this link to The Internet Movie Database. Type in the name of the movie in the search box and press enter. You will be able to find background information on the film, the actors, and links to much more information.

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Copyright © 2016 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.
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Robert Roten can be reached via e-mail at my last name at lariat dot org. [Mailer button: image of letter and envelope]

(If you e-mail me with a question about this or any other movie or review, please mention the name of the movie you are asking the question about, otherwise I may have no way of knowing which film you are referring to)