iTunes Exclusive Episode Free State Of Jones
Rob, Chad, and Don review Free State of Jones, Gary Ross's 215-minute Civil War era film starring Matthew McConaughey as Newton Knight, a Confederate deserter who joins escaped slaves in revolt. The hosts praise the pacing and performances but criticize the film's unfocused narrative, which shifts from a Robin Hood story to a courtroom drama about miscegenation laws and African American voting rights, with the final 30 minutes feeling rushed.
About this episode
Key takeaways
- The film's structure is confused, starting as a Robin Hood civil war story before jumping 78-84 years ahead to a courtroom case, then returning to the main narrative without clear integration
- McConaughey delivers an above-average performance with moments where he disappears into the character, though he maintains his recognizable mannerisms
- Supporting performances from Mahershala Ali and Carey Russell stand out as compelling and well-executed
- The pacing works well for the first hour and a half, but the rushed final 30 minutes undermine the overall film; 30-45 minutes could be cut for a stronger film
- The actual 'Free State of Jones' concept occupies less than 10 minutes of the film despite being the title
Q&A
What is Free State of Jones about?
Matthew McConaughey plays Newton Knight, a Confederate triage nurse who deserts the army after his nephew is killed, then hides with escaped slaves and leads a revolt against the Confederate Army.
What are the main criticisms of the film?
The film tries to be too many things at once—a Robin Hood story, a war film, and a civil rights drama—resulting in an unfocused narrative where the final 30 minutes rush through themes about miscegenation laws and voting rights.
Would the hosts recommend seeing this film?
Yes, but with reservations. Don would recommend a twilight or matinee viewing, while Rob suggests a Redbox rental. They agree it's worth watching but could have been significantly better if trimmed and focused on one narrative direction.
Read Transcript
Green Empire member and or members. If you are hearing the sound of my voice, it means the following conditions have been met. At least once in your life, you have listened to the Clubhouse podcast live every Sunday, night, 70s to and for Pacific, your one-stop shop for all things, sports and entertainment.
We like to call it pop culture. It also means you subscribe on iTunes because it is time for another. I have to use a escalation.
You know, by the way, you got to share it off, I just want you to know that. The 219th one of these things. Welcome.
My name is Rob. I am the executive producer of the Clubhouse podcast and I enjoy the little history on you every once in a game, but I'm not alone for this particular review, joining me across the desk as he tends to do his my co-host and a man who fights his own civil war every day. He is Chad.
Welcome, sir. I don't know. I just had to make something up.
Joining us is the official fact checker of this show. And a man who's never hidden out in the swamp in his entire life, unless you count that one time that he went swimming in a bayou. You may know him as fun, don't go, but his mom and even don't forward, I'm going to call him Don Ford.
Welcome, sir. I'm with swimming in lakes a few times in Montana. There are no, but there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no, there was no.
Whatever due, what we do one of these things, it is to review something in this particular episode is no different. We are here to bring you a review of the latest film directed, oh, I just lost his name by Gary Ross. This is the guy that you would know who's directed.
He directed the first Hunger Games film. He directed Sea Biscuit. He directed Pleasant Film.
There's you also know Chad that he wrote big, no, I did not, it's true. It is called Free State of Jones. And no, it was not filmed in Houston, so it's not the free state of Mike Jones.
Completely different. Starring Matt, you McConaughey, I'm going to tell you something, I'm going to do something instead of what I'm going to have to share it off some time, you know, I'm going to. Also Google my path of raw.
Marchala, my herchala, I'll leave. I hope I said that right. Carrie Russell is in this thing, Christopher Barry, Sean Bridgers and more, it is a true story.
Next place during the Civil War, it's a, I can't call it a Civil War film, though. That's the weird thing about it, Civil War era film, kind of sort of McConaughey plays Newton Knight. He's a guy that starts out fighting for the Confederate Army.
We believe that he's some type of a triage nurse, but we're not real sure. And then he finds out his nephew has been drafted into the war because there were these laws that they had in the south, where basically to keep the soldiers supplied, you could take whatever you wanted from home, whatever you wanted. So his nephew winds up in the army with him, gets killed, and so in order to, I give his nephew a proper burial, he steals a mule and desserts the Confederate army to take him home.
He finds out more about all of the things these soldiers are doing, they're basically starving out their own people. And once they find out he's a dessert or he now becomes a wanted man. He then goes and hides out with a bunch of escape slaves, run away slaves.
And basically starts his own revolt against the Confederate Army. That fair? Yeah, we start the whole thing we got here.
Yes, we got our best friends allied, allied, and aggral or ashley, everybody from Biden, this is the thing, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Okay, this movie is 215 minutes long, let's just start there. I will say from a pacing standpoint, I thought it was past really, really well, but here's the problem.
This film does not know what it wants to be because it starts out kind of a Robinhood civil war era type film. If that makes any sense to you so far, sir, and you deal with his plight and the way things are going. And then it takes a turn, like right in the middle of everything, Elvis hadn't it says 78 years later, 84 years later or something like that.
And it cuts to a court case in Mississippi, where a man is on trial, oddly enough, for his marriage to white couple, but the prosecution or the state is saying that his marriage is not legal because tracing his lineage back to Newton night, but they're saying his mother was African American, therefore making him one eighth African American, not mean his wife, it's great, great, whatever grandmother, which makes him enough African American that his marriage to a white woman is illegal. So we deal with that, and then we cut back to the main story, and then we don't touch this again for like an hour. And you're like, so out of your head again by the time I joined into doc, I was like, I have a question.
There's a big scene you see in the trailer, the big battle at the church. If the movie ended right there, I'd have been cool with that because you know, he wins back, he gets his revenge, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, no, no, we're not done yet. It then turns into a movie that's a message about African American rights and how the South continued to do really, really bad things after the war was over.
And then it dealt with giving African Americans the right to vote, like it just, it was like he had so much he wanted to say, so he just said everything. And it also did that deal, like they didn't, didn't Captain America Civil War. 1963.
Oh, and I know how much you love that. But the weird thing is about this film, I didn't hate this film, but I didn't love this film. And, Donald, you and I talked extensively about this.
I can't say it was good, but I can't say it was bad. It just kind of, it was there. It was there.
I mean, it's got a $50 million budget. So it'll probably make it. Oh, yeah.
It's money. Yeah, if you go to my written review at www.covaspacas.com, that's our website. I put on there that I really liked the pacing, but the last 30 minutes it rushed.
It's like, let's give this great story. At the point like you're saying the church, but then the stuff of the, the right to vote and everything else under the sun. It was rushed.
It's like, oh, I have to add this. We have to add that. It's like we got this nice pacing, everything's going good.
We're good here. We're good here. Matthew Conny is driving the car, going there and all right, all right, all right, all right.
And all of a sudden, room in the last 30 minutes just. But I, one thing I really liked though was, but 20s different, it would go from, you know, it's show time period, then it go about a year ahead, but it talks some history hit tidbits in the bottom of the screen. Yeah.
Yeah. Did that right? Which I really kind of bridge the gap a little bit when it would fast forward, which was fine.
I agree. Yeah, I really liked the way this approach. Historically correct, it was, it was, I really liked the history where they really tried to show the time.
I liked that there are some brutal scenes in here. Don't get me wrong. There's just a little bit of violence, yes.
But they didn't overdo it and they shouldn't for what it needed to be, but it wasn't just about the war. You know, this is about the war in other issues, you know, I'm saying. So it had a good mix of a storyline plus the war, after effects and the brutality of what happened at the time, but just be realistic this happened, this happened, this happened, right?
So in that aspect, they're really liked it, did it drag some of my thoughts on, but the last 30 minutes, just like, let's just, let's just go there now whole concept of the free state of Jones. I want to say it was, like, less than 10 minutes of the actual film, which was weird to me. They should have just called it, like, new night, you know, but I want to say from a form performance standpoint, Marshallah Ali, who you would know, he played bogs in the first 200 games films, bogs, let me show you a picture, okay, okay.
He was outstanding in this, he's like one of the, one of the, one of the most featured faces that you see in the trailer outside of McConnell, you're going to see him very soon. He's playing cottonmouth in the Lute Cage series, okay, he's in House of Cards, he was in mocking J that was, yeah, the Lute is that he was in, he was in Tremay, he's got a lot of, he's got a lot of, he's got a lot of, he's got a lot of, he's got a lot of, I remember him, this guy was amazing, he, he absolutely brought it, the thing with McConaughey that I have, you know, you have some issues with him, I don't have issues with McConaughey because I like McConaughey, yeah, but every movie he does, it's McConaughey, you know what I mean, it's, it's all he's just that guy, man, I'm going to tell you what, we're going to over here, even, even Dallas buyers club to a certain extent, was he one of the Oscar for? Well, he deserved.
Yeah, my opinion. It got a little, all right, all right, all right, all right, all right for me. There were moments in this film where he kind of disappeared in the world, now worse, one of the worst beards in the history of cinema, I'm just going to say it, but it was gritty, that's why I liked about it because they were not all, Hollywood make up, know this, you know, this was, you've seen better beards in that film, yeah, but he was, I wouldn't say this is one of the best performances he's ever done, but this was above the board for him.
There were moments where he kind of disappeared into it for me, which I was cool with, but I mean, I'm intrigued by it, but it just, it disappointed me because I really set the bar pretty high for this, given the trailers. And it just didn't go anywhere for me, like this movie could have been probably 30 minutes shorter. You know, you take out the flash forward, take out everything after the church scene, actually probably could have 45 minutes out of this, and it's a much better film, but totally, I agree with you, I, I, I, I, I thought my kind of hate to great, and I didn't really think of the, you know, guy from days and confused, I didn't think of a guy, you know, Carrie Russell does a really good job in this.
She plays his, his first wife, I guess, the color. She kind of bolts when things get a little weird. I didn't know she was in, but she, she really kind of stretches her acting muscles a little bit.
And I was really impressed with her, uh, Google Mbatharaw, who plays the, uh, the, you know, you've seen her in a bunch of stuff too, you've seen her in stuff a reason. So great acting, and there's some beautiful shots in the first scene, she played the wife in concussion. I was bad to say it, but I will say, the first scene, I mean, it starts on the battlefield.
Yes. And it was really, it's very, very, very, very, very, very, yeah, use of a word, private Ryan kind of, wow, I mean, and it's pretty, it's pretty violent, like it's pretty graphic. I mean, it's just, this movie's weird for me, for me, not that bad.
I mean, I, I, I, the, the 30 last 30 rushed, that's what killed it, but beyond, I love the first hour and a half. I loved it. I feel like you, you really could have paired this down and it would be a better film.
If you just kept, kept one direction with it, it would have been a better film, but I didn't hate it. Like, I can't say, unlike other films that we screened in the same week, I can't say that it's two hours and 15 minutes of my life that I want back, because it was a good film. It just to me, it wasn't as good as it could be.
Yeah. Well, I want to see it. I mean, you're, and you haven't really told me, if you, if you, if you watch it, you're not going to say, hey, I wasted my time.
Hey, this thing was horrible. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. It was worth, it was worth. And I think you'll come to the same conclusion, too, of, I, I see what they're saying.
Yeah. I mean, you haven't told me anything that makes me not want to see it. You know, and Charlotte was with me, you know, she's a huge history buff, right?
She was kind of mad with it. She likes some of it. She didn't like some of it.
And it's just, and I can't say I'm neutral about the film, like, it was good. I, I could, like, I could curb your enthusiasm, it was pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty. You know what I mean?
Well, if you're history buff, you're going to like it. Yeah. You're going to love it.
And it, it tells the story. I can say that. Anything else before we get to the final analysis?
Not really. All right. The way we do the final analysis on this show, we're not going to give you thumbs-up thumbs down, let her grade stars, anything like that.
Our audience whom we affectionately refer to as the Empire, they wanted to dig deeper, so we're going to dig deeper. Two questions are involved here. Question number one, would we see this film again that the answers know we're done here?
If the answers, yes, I'm going to start from the top ranking work my way down. Top ranking would, would be, I would pay for this at an evening show. Well, price theater.
All the way down from there, we go twilight, matinee, early morning on a weekend, second run in the dollar theater, red box Netflix cable. Dawn, would you see this film again? Yes.
You would. How far are you willing to go? I'd recommend it to see either a twilight or matinee, okay?
I would see this again. I'm going to go a little bit lower than that. I think a red box rental would be good for this.
Just to kind of settle in when you really aren't, don't know what you're in the mood for. Yeah, it's supposed to get one of those rentals where you get the extras. Yeah, yeah, because in my past something, yeah, yeah, that might be a good idea.
Get some of the extras and get some maybe a commentary track or something. Or maybe a documentary about, yeah, it's a fair point. It is free state of Jones directed by Gary Ross.
Before we end this thing, again, we got to think our best friends. All right. All right.
All right. See the plugs. Visit our website, the aforementioned, www.theclubhousepodcast.com.
Find out everything you need to know and some stuff you don't. Check us out on Instagram and on Facebook. The clubhouse podcast, but the whole thing there.
Twitter? Clubhouse show. You can follow me on Twitter if you'd like.
I admit, yes, that Rob Irvin that has spelled ERV. I end. I am at chat in PG69 on Twitter.
I'm at fun. Don't go and you can email me at Don at theclubhousepodcast.com. Email Don.
If you want to come to a live show for you, we'd love to do in live shows and hang out with the Empire. You can email me. Questions, comments, concerns, time to go.
Pound Sand. I'm Rob at theclubhousepodcast.com. I am chat at theclubhousepodcast.com.
Charlotte Parker's on Pinterest because we are morally obligated to say that. Jules Wormick, I'm interested to see her view on this because she is a British just sent. So maybe she doesn't have that depth of knowledge that we would have of stuff we learned in school here.
Indeed. Our normal show is live every Sunday, night, 70's turn for Pacific, your one stop shop for all things pop culture or just keep subscribing on iTunes and you get everything. So until next time, for Don, for Chad, for the Empire, I'm Rob.
Clubhouse is closed. Still know if you could put pretty palmering this thing and you could put it just about anything. Bye.