The Free State of Jones
05/10/16 Filed in: Cinema
Today we saw The Free State of Jones, a drama set during the American Civil War. It stars Matthew McConaughey as Newton Knight, a man who walked away from the civil war conflict to set up a community of like-minded people, including a number of former slaves. The reviews have been mixed, some professional critics having a problem with the fact that it's "yet another" black slavery story told from a white perspective. Audiences, meanwhile, see-saw between thinking it to be brilliant, to believing that it is too long, has too many sub plots and is too slow. I enjoyed it, if for nothing else that it showed once more the struggle that then existed, and still exists to this day, for African Americans seeking equality in society.
A young kinsman of Knight is killed during a battle, and this is the catalyst for him deserting, albeit initially solely to return his son's body home. Having been branded a deserter there's no going back and after escaping a posse with chase dogs he is helped to a refuge in the Mississippi swamps, where he meets former slaves. Meanwhile the confederate soldiers are taking food and livestock from farming families and Knight's support for them transforms him and his group from being merely a nuisance into a perceived threat to the confederacy. His group grows as he convinces them that the real enemy are the land owners, whose sons are not conscripted. "We are fighting a war for their cotton".
A young kinsman of Knight is killed during a battle, and this is the catalyst for him deserting, albeit initially solely to return his son's body home. Having been branded a deserter there's no going back and after escaping a posse with chase dogs he is helped to a refuge in the Mississippi swamps, where he meets former slaves. Meanwhile the confederate soldiers are taking food and livestock from farming families and Knight's support for them transforms him and his group from being merely a nuisance into a perceived threat to the confederacy. His group grows as he convinces them that the real enemy are the land owners, whose sons are not conscripted. "We are fighting a war for their cotton".
It is a long film at 140 minutes, and the pace is fairly slow, but it's beautifully filmed and realistically staged. There's an interesting cut to the future, where a descendant of Knight is in court charged with breaking the segregation laws that forbade mixed coloured-white marriages. Knight had taken a common-law negro wife, his legal wife having left after the death of their eldest son. It is a descendant of that son by mixed partnership who appears in court, showing that a generation on, after all the suffering for equality, not a lot had changed.
If you have an interest in American history then it's a film that I would recommend. Matthew McConaughey plays Newton Knight very convincingly, both in manner and looks.
If you have an interest in American history then it's a film that I would recommend. Matthew McConaughey plays Newton Knight very convincingly, both in manner and looks.