Free State of Jones

Fighting: Hollywood has succeeded in making an interesting story about fighting! I guess actual fighting takes up very little screen time, but every scene involving actual fighting was interesting - why they were fighting was focused on over how, and you could always see the why behind the how. The scene with men marching in a line and getting slaughtered was interesting and made sense; likewise the trench warfare scene.

Rotten Tomatoes: Free State of Jones has 40% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, which is a joke when The Conjuring 2 is "Certified Fresh." But the Rotten Tomatoes scoring is not the issue (i.e., their binary system of scoring) because Metacritic has it as 53%. It seems that a lot of critics are piling on (although is there really hate for the movie from critics, or just lukewarmitude? Because I haven't found any reviews that say it's terrible).  Metacritic even has a bunch of user reviews of "0" without good reasons. I went to Reddit to see what the reaction was there, but they weren't on the hate train. A couple of people found it depressing in the last third and wished for something a little more ... formulaic? There were a couple of comments that the trailer promised an action movie but there was little action to be found. There were several complaints about pacing. However, by and large, people seemed bemused as to why it isn't getting better reviews. I'm used to comedies being underrated, but not movies like this.

So What's It About?: A Mississippian deserts his post as a Confederate nurse and takes a dead kinsman's body back home. No longer welcome back in the army (or interested in returning), he hides out in a swamp with a small band of runaway slaves. This is early in the war; events continue from there, with more people deserting, and with him continuing to be heroic in a populist way. Events continue through 1875, and there are flash-forwards to a related court case in the 1940s.

Is It Worth Seeing?: Yes! It was interesting to see this chapter of history that I'd never heard of. Someone on Reddit wrote that he's from a nearby county, and when people are going there they say they are going to the Free State of Jones.