Slave army breaks ‘Free’
Is it a good time for a film “based on actual events,” telling the story of a white Mississippi Civil War veteran turned leader of an army of slaves and oppressed poor white farmers, rebelling against the Confederacy? Can you say, “I am Spartacus”?
“Free State of Jones,” which features Academy Award-winner Matthew McConaughey as the double reb and savior Newton Knight, can be based on all the actual events it likes. It remains a mistimed, out-of-step, great white hope fable, and a not very good one at that. Director Gary Ross’ career started out promisingly with such films as “Pleasantville” and “Seabiscuit.” But his work on the more recent “The Hunger Games” was a low point. Ross brings those “Hunger Games” shaky-cams to “Free State of Jones” and, indeed, at times it seems as if we are watching the Civil War version of “The Hunger Games.”
“Free State of Jones” is set somewhere around 1863. The South is losing, and a worn-out, torn-up Confederate army forcibly collects livestock and food from poor Mississippi farmers, many widows with children who can’t afford to give what little they have. After Newt leaves his post in the blood-soaked field to return his dead nephew to the boy’s mother, he is reunited with his estranged but desperate wife, Serena (Keri Russell making an impression in a role that is foggy at best).
Newt becomes a wanted man after an unlikely and laughable showdown with a Confederate lieutenant (Bill Tangradi) and his troops. Newt flees to the swamp, where he camps with escaped slaves and Rachel (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), a house servant who helped nurse Newt’s sick son. Newt proves himself to the skeptical slaves by removing one man’s irons, and a romance blooms between him and Rachel. “I brought you some biscuits,” she trills. Rachel is also a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of her horrible plantation-owning master. Any questions?
Newt’s ragtag army grows and conquers counties, defeating a division in one battle. Eventually, the Free State of Jones secedes from the Confederacy. At times, the film reminds one of “Django Unchained,” “12 Years a Slave” and even Clint Eastwood’s great revisionist 1976 Western “The Outlaw Josie Wales.” But it is nowhere near as great as those films. Newt is a droning bore. Flash-forwards to a courtroom in Mississippi in the 1950s, where a descendant of Newt is on trial for breaking racist laws, are unnecessary and a terrible idea.
Some of the staging is clumsy. Mahershala Ali (TV’s “House of Cards”) is very good as former slave Moses. Ross, who co-wrote the meandering screenplay, does himself no favors letting McConaughey, who unleashes his thousand-yard stare, devour the scenery, giving speeches, preaching sermons, speaking over the bodies of the dead and upstaging the film’s heroine. E pluribus, oh, shut up.
(“Free State of Jones” contains gruesome war-violence imagery.)