{"id":6236,"date":"2016-12-02T07:35:55","date_gmt":"2016-12-02T12:35:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6236"},"modified":"2016-12-12T12:30:13","modified_gmt":"2016-12-12T17:30:13","slug":"loving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6236","title":{"rendered":"Loving"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"loving,

Ruth Negga & Joel Edgerton in Loving<\/p><\/div>\n

The landmark 1967 Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia<\/em>, which ended state bans on interracial marriage is brought to life here, lovingly, (trailer<\/a>). This fine film is from writer\/director Jeff Nichols, whose script has been called subtle and \u201cscrupulously intelligent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hard though it may be to believe that miscegenation laws persisted more than a century after the Civil War, at the time the case was decided, 16 Southern states had such laws. Virginia\u2019s law put Richard Loving and his wife, Mildred Jeter Loving\u2014and their three children\u2014at serious risk.<\/p>\n

Richard and Mildred marry in Washington, D.C., knowing Virginia authorities would give them problems, and when they return home and are caught, their attorney advises them to plead guilty to \u201ccohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth.\u201d They are given a suspended sentence contingent on a promise to leave Virginia and not return (together) for at least 25 years. If they are found together in the state, they\u2019ll go to prison. The judge\u2019s sentence effectively turns them into exiles in their own country.<\/p>\n

Life in the District of Columbia is not easy or pleasant for two rural people. It is too crowded, too loud, too fast, and too dangerous for their children. But the Civil Rights movement is happening around them, and a letter Mildred writes to Attorney General Robert Kennedy ends up in the hands of the American Civil Liberties Union, which takes on their case pro bono<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The decisions the Lovings make and why they make them are the meat of the movie. And while they don\u2019t necessarily understand the machinations of the law and the courts or the strategies of their lawyers, their quiet courage is clear. As critic Mal Vincent<\/a> wrote in the (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot<\/em>, \u201cIn the end, when you think about the film’s \u2018message,\u2019 it is a very simple one. With so much hate in the world, should we suppress any effort to express love?\u201d<\/p>\n

With a strong supporting cast, Joel Edgerton as Richard and Ruth Negga as Mildred do a standout job in low-key, tender performances that never stray into sentimentality. Late in the day, Richard is asked whether there\u2019s anything he wants to say to the Supreme Court Justices. He gives his lawyer a how can I make this any plainer?<\/em> glance and says, \u201cYeah. Tell the judge I love my wife.\u201d That\u2019s all the Court\u2014and the Virginia legislature, and the county sheriff, and anyone else\u2014should need to know.<\/p>\n

Rotten Tomatoes<\/a> critics\u2019 rating: 90%; audiences, 79%<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The landmark 1967 Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia, which ended state bans on interracial marriage is brought to life here, lovingly, (trailer). This fine film is from writer\/director Jeff Nichols, whose script has been called subtle and \u201cscrupulously intelligent.\u201d … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Loving - a \"scrupulously intelligent\" script for a tender movie about a couple whose love changed the US Constitution","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[57,359,104],"tags":[128,719,720,718,416,721],"class_list":["post-6236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movies","category-review","category-the-morgue","tag-history","tag-jeff-nichols","tag-joel-edgerton","tag-loving-v-virginia","tag-real-life","tag-ruth-negga"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s2NkiT-loving","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6236"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6236\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6238,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6236\/revisions\/6238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}