Newton Knight is a man you probably won’t find in your history books, which is why director Gary Ross decided to make a movie about his exploits–Free State of Jones.
The movie follows the story of Confederate army medic Knight (Matthew McConaughey) who deserts his regiment, returns home and begins a rebellion during the Civil War in 1863. Introduced as a poor farmer who’s seen death and dismemberment throughout his service, Knight flees his company after the tragic loss of his kin. When he arrives in his native Jones County, Mississippi, he’s greeted with the cost of war; family, friends and neighbors have had their lands, belongings and sons stripped from them, all in the name of furthering the Confederacy.
A man of faith and one who’s fed up with fighting so that rich plantation owners “can keep their cotton,” Knight sparks a revolt, recruiting deserters, fellow white farmers and people who escaped slavery to establish a state free from the tyranny of government where a man is not defined by race, color or societal standing but instead, by what he sows.
It’s a narrative made all the more surprising because it’s based in truth.
“Obviously, it’s a very heroic story of struggle and rebellion, but I just became very interested with Southern Unionism, in the fact that the Confederacy was not unanimous,” Ross tells Guideposts.org “That was something I wanted to share.”
While most films depict the Civil War as confrontation between the North and the South, Ross shows not only the conflict and cost of war but what life looked like after it ended. A big part of the film is dedicated to the Reconstruction Era, the time immediately following the war when the South was restored to the Union. We see that slavery didn’t just end with the Confederacy’s surrender; instead, it took on other names. Similarly, freedmen wishing to exercise their newly given right to vote faced discrimination and violence thanks to terrorist groups like the Ku Klux Klan.
Ross’ film spans all of this, sometimes disjointedly and at a disservice to the main narrative. Flash-forwards to the real trial of Knight’s descendant — a product of his common law marriage to a former slave named Rachel — in 1940 show that racism was alive and well almost a century after Knight’s campaign.
“I think it’s important to see that these issues don’t go away,” Ross said of the film’s sweeping timeline. “[That trial] just shows that the past is never dead, it’s not even passed. It takes a lot to deal with, cope and ultimately purge these issues.”
Ross hopes the story of Knight can provide an example of how we all should fight together for racial equality.
“If we don’t celebrate allies like Newt Knight who have the courage to stand up for racial justice, we’re not going to make any progress,” Ross says. “I don’t think we can afford to self-segregate. We have to forge interdependence with one another and I think Newt is a shining example of that.”
The director also addresses criticism that the main lead in a story largely focused on race relations and racial inequality is a white man.
“There are some people that are uncomfortable that I would make a movie that involves race with a white protagonist but I think it’s very important to do so,” Ross says. “Race is an issue that we all have to engage in America or we’re not going to make any progress. I think it’s important to observe, cite and follow the example of somebody who had the guts to engage it at a much tougher time than right now. That’s something worthy of being celebrated.”
