Looking to be one of the big period dramas gracing our screens in the coming years, Gary Ross's Free State Of Jones boasts a compelling real-life story and Matthew McConaughey in the lead. Watch the first trailer below.
McConaughey is here playing real-life advocate Newton Knight. A Mississippi man who had been a loyal Confederate recruit in the American Civil War, he defected from the army and took a group of like-minded troops with him to create the Free State of Jones. Knight later married a slave (Gugu Mbatha-Raw’s Rachel), creating one of the first ever publicised mixed race unions in the South, fought against the Confederates from within his new state and led a daring raid to free children who were still enslaved following the end of the conflict.
Of course, it wasn't quite that easy, as his former military masters decided to hunt him and his new community down, forcing Knight to take up guerilla tactics against the army.
With Jacob Lofland, Keri Russell, Mahershala Ali, Sean Bridgers and Christopher Barry in the cast and Ross both writing and directing, Free State Of Jones opens in US cinemas on May 13 before hitting our screens on May 27.