Powerful and necessary telling of a tale most of us already know

Rating: 8/10 (19 January 2019)

Mississippi Burning (1988)
A powerful movie with a handful of first rate actors and a story of injustice that gets worse and worse. Gene Hackman leads the stellar performances-he's phenomenal-with Willem Dafoe and a young Frances McDormand supporting him beautifully.
I don't think the plot is exactly what moves this story along, but rather the overall theme. In fact, the brutal, ignorant racism that underlies the motives of the Mississippi men in the movie is a kind of given for the 1960s (and unfortunately, in some quarters, to this day). The FBI swooping down on this town is not quite the admirable sight it should be, and that's to the credit of the moviemakers. Large institutional law enforcement was necessary to break the local politics (and morality) there, but it comes off as heavy handed and insensitive.
And that's where Hackman thrives, being the loner amidst the crowd, doing the dirty work necessary and that ends up being heroic in the end.
The filming (and all the fires suggested by the title) make for a vigorous movie to watch. It's a good, classic telling of a well known tale. And I hint at what makes the movie a little limited-it is telling a story we all kind of know, that there were a lot of truly hateful white people inflicting harm and violence onf black people in the deep South. I wish it had found a way to make it more distinctive. Maybe for those who don't really know all this happened, it's a big bang way to find out, but if you already have the gist of it in your head, this will travel some familiar ground.
It tells its story so well, however, it's still a great watch. So watch.