{"id":47722,"date":"2016-06-17T19:01:27","date_gmt":"2016-06-17T19:01:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=47722"},"modified":"2016-06-17T19:01:27","modified_gmt":"2016-06-17T19:01:27","slug":"a-confederate-dissident-in-a-film-with-footnotes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=47722","title":{"rendered":"A Confederate Dissident, in a Film With Footnotes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/06\/16\/movies\/free-state-of-jones-a-film-with-footnotes.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong><em>A Confederate Dissident, in a Film With Footnotes<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\" target=\"_blank\">The New York Times<\/a><br \/>\n2016-06-15<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jennyschuessler\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Jennifer Schuessler<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" id=\"nyt_video_player\" title=\"New York Times Video - Embed Player\" src=\"http:\/\/graphics8.nytimes.com\/video\/players\/offsite\/index.html?videoId=100000004434992\" width=\"480\" height=\"321\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"> <\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The forthcoming <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Matthew_McConaughey\" target=\"_blank\">Matthew McConaughey<\/a> drama \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Free_State_of_Jones_(film)\" target=\"_blank\">Free State of Jones<\/a>\u201d lays claim to being the first <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Cinema_of_the_United_States\" target=\"_blank\">Hollywood<\/a> film in decades to depict <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Reconstruction_Era\" target=\"_blank\">Reconstruction<\/a>, the still controversial post-<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/American_Civil_War\" target=\"_blank\">Civil War<\/a> period that attempted to rebuild the South along racially egalitarian lines.<\/p>\n<p>But the movie, written and directed by <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gary_Ross\" target=\"_blank\">Gary Ross<\/a>, might also lay claim to a more unusual title: the first Hollywood drama to come with footnotes.<\/p>\n<p>The film recounts the true story of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Newton_Knight\" target=\"_blank\">Newton Knight<\/a> (Mr. McConaughey), a <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Confederate_States_Army\" target=\"_blank\">Confederate<\/a> deserter who led a ragtag dissident army from the swamps of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jones_County%2C_Mississippi\" target=\"_blank\">Jones County, Miss.<\/a>, and continued to fight for the rights of African-Americans after the Civil War ended&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;Where Mr. Ross has invented characters or episodes or made guesses about motivations, he explains why, pointing to justifications in the historical record. For example, the film depicts Knight\u2019s decades-long relationship with Rachel (played by <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gugu_Mbatha-Raw\" target=\"_blank\">Gugu Mbatha-Raw<\/a> of \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Belle_(2013_film)\" target=\"_blank\">Belle<\/a>\u201d), a former slave who once belonged to his grandfather and with whom he had several children. The site shows an 1876 document in which Knight (who remained married to his white wife) deeded her 160 acres of land \u2014 an indication, Mr. Ross writes, that theirs was \u201ca loving relationship that grew over time,\u201d rather than manifesting a \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Thomas_Jefferson\" target=\"_blank\">Thomas Jefferson<\/a>\/<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sally_Hemings\" target=\"_blank\">Sally Hemings<\/a> power dynamic.\u201d Knight did not own slaves.<\/p>\n<p>The extent of Knight\u2019s collaborations across the color line has been a point of sometimes <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=12260\" target=\"_blank\">hot debate among scholars<\/a>, including those on Mr. Ross\u2019s team. In 2009, after <a href=\"http:\/\/www.johnstauffer.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Mr. Stauffer<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sally_Jenkins\" target=\"_blank\">Sally Jenkins <\/a>published \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/knopfdoubleday.com\/book\/87133\/the-state-of-jones\/\" target=\"_blank\">The State of Jones<\/a>,\u201d a book inspired by Mr. Ross\u2019s screenplay, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/vikki_bynum\" target=\"_blank\">Ms. Bynum<\/a> posted a blistering three-part review on her blog, questioning what she called its \u201chighly exaggerated claims\u201d that Knight had fought for racial equality before and after the war&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;It remains to be seen how Mr. Ross\u2019s film will land with audiences. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kelliecarterjackson.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Kellie Carter Jackson<\/a>, an assistant professor of history at Hunter College and the author of the coming book \u201cForce and Freedom: Black Abolitionists and the Politics of Violence,\u201d said there was a need for a more accurate depiction of Reconstruction, but noted that Hollywood \u201chas a hard time divesting white men from the center of the universe.\u201d&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Read the entire article <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/06\/16\/movies\/free-state-of-jones-a-film-with-footnotes.html\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Confederate Dissident, in a Film With Footnotes The New York Times 2016-06-15 Jennifer Schuessler The forthcoming Matthew McConaughey drama \u201cFree State of Jones\u201d lays claim to being the first Hollywood film in decades to depict Reconstruction, the still controversial post-Civil War period that attempted to rebuild the South along racially egalitarian lines. But the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,459,1196,8,1459,6940,20],"tags":[5505,15676,16992,3883,18372,2640,1457,1456,4374,2327,1453,1454],"class_list":["post-47722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-history","category-literary-criticism","category-media-archive","category-mississippi","category-slavery","category-usa","tag-gary-ross","tag-gugu-mbatha-raw","tag-jennifer-schuessler","tag-jones-county","tag-matthew-mcconaughey","tag-new-york-times","tag-newt-knight","tag-newton-knight","tag-rachel-knight","tag-the-new-york-times","tag-victoria-bynum","tag-victoria-e-bynum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47722"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47722\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47724,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47722\/revisions\/47724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}