Most period war dramas have a pretty good success rate with critics and the general public. This particular one is set in the American Civil War. There have been a few pretty good ones in the past such as Glory, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Cold Mountain and many others.

With Gary Ross, director of Seabiscuit and the first Hunger Games at the helm, and Matthew McConaughey playing the lead, this definitely had high hopes for this being an Oscar contender.

But with being released just before many would see as the start of the Oscar film releases, there were doubts the people making it knew it was going to be a failure.
So I was certainly going into the film with mixed emotions.

In the end, I managed to like it more then I expected. From the action-packed opening, we instantly see the brutality of not only the violence not holding back, but the American Civil War itself.
Then the rest of the film tells this fascinating and impressive that is to hard to believe happened at that pivotal part of American history.

Matthew McConaughey is obviously the big draw that will hopefully put bums on seats, and he gives a great performance in the leading role. He is still doing his 'McConaughssence' and it is always a pleasure to see. His performance alone gives this film a high rating from me. I cannot wait for his next feature 'Gold', which I am hoping to see in a few months time.
In fact, the entire cast deserves to be applauded for their performances. Mahershala Ali was certainly the most notable supporting role. Gugu Mbatha-Raw continues to impress me as her transition from British TV to Hollywood is become more than just a reality. It was nice to see Keri Russell make an appearance. She plays a perfectly fine role and I hope to see her continue with more projects.

From a technical standpoint, the murky imagery and visuals for me was pretty satisfying and the landscapes looked great and I was happy to see the locations really fit the tone and feel to it.

Not many negatives from me. But from a general side, I can see a few demographics being bored by this as it is a little on the long side at 2hrs 19mins. I still managed to be intrigued with it all the way. But I can definitely see where people will begin lagging and dozing off.

However, one part that I was really questioning myself with was a sub-plot that gets dipped into now and again before playing a bigger role towards the end. Whilst it was interesting and probably important, it felt out of place. I think that it was due to the moments chosen to dip in and out of it. However when I thought about it, I could not think of a better place to put them. So maybe, it might have been easier to put on a small bit of text at the end explaining that particular situation.

While I very much enjoyed it and highly recommend it. I think it may have lacked the emotional punch that could have won more people over. I think it may have been that Ross and his team were maybe trying to cover too much history instead of concentrating on the characters and intensity a bit more.
But t is nice to see a small story occur during one of the biggest wars of all-time. The battle scenes ware pretty good, including an impressive looking opening battle scene that gives the war quite a scope. You will likely see comparisons of Robin Hood, 12 Years A Slave and Django Unchained in here. While most of those comparisons are superior to Free State Of Jones, I feel that this still need to seen.

Rating: 8/10