# Ghosts of Mississippi

Ghosts of Mississippi is a 1996 American biographical courtroom drama film directed by Rob Reiner and starring Alec Baldwin, Whoopi Goldberg, and James Woods. The film is based on the 1994 trial of Byron De La Beckwith, a white supremacist accused of the 1963 assassination of civil rights activist Medgar Evers.
Released on December 20, 1996, the film received mixed reviews from critics and grossed just $13 million against its $36 million budget. At the 69th Academy Awards, it was nominated for Best Supporting Actor (Woods) and Best Makeup.

## Plot

Medgar Evers was an African-American civil rights activist in Mississippi murdered on June 12, 1963. It was suspected that Byron De La Beckwith, a white supremacist, was the murderer. He had been tried twice in the 1960s and both trials ended in hung juries. Evers' widow Myrlie Evers had been trying to bring De La Beckwith to justice for over 25 years.
In 1989, emboldened by a newspaper article by Jerry Mitchell exposing jury tampering by the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission in the first two trials, Myrlie Evers believed she had what it would take to bring him to trial again. Although most of the evidence from the old trial had disappeared, Bobby DeLaughter, an assistant District Attorney, decided to help her despite being warned that it might hurt his political aspirations and the strain that it caused in his marriage. DeLaughter forms a team of investigators from his office, however, the investigation suffers many setbacks.
After learning that several of the key witnesses have died, and the court transcript of their testimony from the 1960s trials is lost, the team is convinced this is a futile effort. This is reinforced when DeLaughter fails at a desperate strategy of convincing two police officers who provided De La Beckwith with an alibi in the 1960s trials to admit they lied under oath. However, their pessimism fades with two discoveries. The rifle used in the murder, thought to have been lost, was hiding in plain sight. Later, one of the investigators learns of the existence of a witness unknown to the prosecution in the 1960s trials, Delmar Dennis. Dennis was a former member of the Ku Klux Klan who agreed to be an undercover informant for the FBI. Dennis testified against the Klan in the Mississippi Burning case, and once mentioned having met De La Beckwith. The investigation turns to finding Dennis, who was living in hiding since turning state's evidence on the KKK, to see what he knows of the case.
Once confirming that Dennis indeed had met De La Beckwith, the team is optimistic they have enough to secure a new indictment. As knowledge becomes public that the district attorney's office has re-opened the case, white supremacist elements threaten DeLaughter and his children, having by this time separated from his wife. After committing to Myrlie that he will try De La Beckwith again, Myrlie, initially skeptical of DeLaughter, reveals that she has a court certified transcript of one of the 1960s trials in her possession. DeLaughter had long sought such a transcript to be able to read testimony from deceased witnesses to the jury for the new trial. DeLaughter mostly presents the same case as was presented in the 1960s trial, with the addition of Dennis and two other witnesses who supported Dennis's testimony. Detective Lloyd Bennett read the testimony of his father, Detective LC Bennett, the officer who found the murder weapon while searching the crime scene, to the jury.
In 1994, De La Beckwith was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. The film ends with Myrlie tearfully rejoicing to the assembled crowd at the courthouse that she never gave up in the fight for justice for Medgar.

## Cast

* Alec Baldwin as Bobby DeLaughter
* Whoopi Goldberg as Myrlie Evers
* James Woods as Byron De La Beckwith
* Virginia Madsen as Dixie DeLaughter
* Susanna Thompson as Peggy Lloyd
* Craig T. Nelson as Ed Peters
* Lucas Black as Burt DeLaughter
* Alexa Vega as Claire DeLaughter
* William H. Macy as Charlie Crisco
* Benny Bennett as Lloyd "Benny" Bennett (Himself)
* Diane Ladd as Grandma Caroline Moore
* Margo Martindale as Clara Mayfield
* Darrell Evers as Himself
* Yolanda King as Reena Evers
* Jerry Levine as Jerry Mitchell
* James Van Evers as Himself
* Ramon Bieri as James Holley
* Michael O'Keefe as Merrida Coxwell
* Bill Smitrovich as Jim Kitchens
* Terry O'Quinn as Judge Hilburn
* Rex Linn as Martin Scott
* James Pickens Jr. as Medgar Evers
* Richard Riehle as Tommy Mayfield
* Bonnie Bartlett as Billie DeLaughter
* Brock Peters as Walter Williams
* Wayne Rogers as Morris Dees
* Bill Cobbs as Charles Evers
* Jerry Hardin as Grandpa Barney DeLaughter
* Jim Harley as Delmar Dennis
* Early Whitesides as Ross Barnett

## Music

The soundtrack of the film, with a score by Marc Shaiman, featured two versions of the Billy Taylor composition "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free" – one sung by Dionne Farris and the other by Nina Simone – as well as numbers by Muddy Waters, Tony Bennett, Robert Johnson and B.B. King.

## Reception

Ghosts of Mississippi received mixed reviews from critics, though the performances of Goldberg and Woods were praised. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes the film holds an approval rating of 41% based on 29 reviews, with an average rating of 5.6/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "James Woods is convincing as a white supremacist, but everything else rings false in this courtroom drama, which examines a weighty subject from the least interesting perspective." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale.
Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert gave the film two thumbs down, with both commenting that the film should have focused more on the story of Medgar Evers instead of Baldwin's character.
The film was not a financial success, making less than half of its budget back. Later, Alec Baldwin referred to the film as "tepid": "In ’96, I did The Edge and Ghosts of Mississippi. And that’s when you hear the sound of the wheels of the train screeching to a halt. The Edge and Ghosts of Mississippi were my last shots at the arcade, so to speak. Both movies were out in ’97. They bombed.”

### Accolades

| Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result |
| Academy Awards | Best Supporting Actor | James Woods | Nominated |
| Academy Awards | Best Makeup | Matthew W. Mungle and Deborah La Mia Denaver | Nominated |
| Chicago Film Critics Association Awards | Best Supporting Actor | James Woods | Nominated |
| Critics Choice Awards | Best Supporting Actor | James Woods | Nominated |
| Golden Globe Awards | Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture | James Woods | Nominated |
| Heartland Film Festival | Truly Moving Picture | Rob Reiner | Won |
| NAACP Image Awards | Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture | Whoopi Goldberg | Nominated |
| Online Film & Television Association Awards | Best Supporting Actor | James Woods | Nominated |
| Political Film Society Awards | Human Rights | Human Rights | Won |
| Southeastern Film Critics Association Awards | Best Supporting Actor | James Woods | Runner-up |