Dee Rees’s Mudbound plants itself firmly in Mississippi circa WWII, winding its way through the lives of a black family with deep, world-weary roots as they live and work as sharecroppers on the farm of a (once affluent) white family.
Nakedly ambitious, Mudbound is a rural epic, chronicling the continuous rises and falls of each family, spanning years and perspectives, cross-cutting from the battlefields of WWII to insidious conflict back home among fields of cotton. An extensive ensemble cast rotates throughout the film (Rob Morgan and Carey Mulligan shine especially bright), while Rachel Morrison’s Academy Award-nominated cinematography breathes life into the haunted history of the American South with effortless grace.
Re-contextualizing historical injustice by folding the framework of generational racism and poverty into the quotidian family dynamics on screen, Rees creates a film which plumbs the hidden—and blatant—hardness of our hearts, the longevity of the sins of our fathers, and the difficult path forward. — Josh Hamm
Arts & Faith Lists:
2017 Arts & Faith Ecumenical Jury — #8