Free State of Jones

Jones County Mississippi is full of poor but well-meaninged farmers who are sick of fighting so the rich man can stay home and control their slaves. Newton Knight (Matthew McConaghey) is one such man after his implied nephew is unexpectedly killed when he is only a teenager. He is a runaway and the Confederate Army is after him. He is forced to hide out in the swamps with runaway slaves, which he doesn't have a problem with, mainly because they are in the same boat, pissed off at the rich southern white man. Eventually many other deserters join them and fight against the Confederate Army, getting their supplies back. Even though the army promises not to hang deserters who want to rejoin the army, this proves to be a lie and so even the women fight back, firing at them at a fake funeral for the deserters. However, the fight is not over, not even after the war is won, the African Americans still have few rights and Newt tries to change that, but the Klan makes that too difficult.
Unfortunately, the film has a big problem. In addition to the main plot line, it has another equally interesting and compelling plot line of Newt's great-grandson (Brian Lee Franklin) who is in big trouble for marrying a white woman when he is one-eighth black. It is a great story and one that probably deserves its own film. Which leads us to the other problem, with weird love life of Newton. He is married to Serena (Keri Russell, in a thankless role) but she leaves and moves to Georgia but returns after her farm is burned down again but Newt has already taken up with the African American woman Rachel (Gugu Mbatha-Raw, in another thankless role but with more meat and great American accent) and does have a child with her. Despite this the two women co-exist well, probably because back then you needed to have a husband and Newt is a decent human being.
Again, both plots are great and the acting is decent as the cast is huge and filled with small, no-name actors and McConaghey is actually very good and fortunately carries the film. Mahershala Ali is also great as an escaped slave who has a guard around his head. He is especially great when he goes around to recruit African Americans to vote.
The scenery is also great and the mise-en-scene is also superb so it is a shame that the film is too board and tries to cover too much ground for it to be as worthwhile and epic as it should have been. Grade: B