"Prom Night in Mississippi" Review - Written by Mathius Mack Gertz

Prom Night in Mississippi
USA, 2009, 90min., color
Genre: Documentary
Director/Screenwriter: Paul Saltzman
Producers: Paul Saltzman, Patricia Aquino
Cinematographers: Bongo, Don Warren, Paul Saltzman
Editors: Kevin Schjerning, Stephen Philipson
Sound: Thabi Moyo, Corey Easley


In 1997, Academy Award winning actor, Morgan Freeman, who lives in the Charleston, Mississippi community, offered to fund the first-ever integrated Senior Prom in the history of Charleston's one high school. His offer was ignored. In 2008, Morgan offered again... the East Tallahatchie County School Board accepted. In this town of 2,300 people, its high school of 415 (70%/30%) black and white students has, to this day, always had separate proms: one black and one white. Prom Night in Mississippi follows the Charleston High senior class of 2008 preparing and attending their historic, first ever integrated prom, in the context of strong emotions, traditions, and conflict inherent in race relations in the community, in the Deep South, and by national association throughout the United States.

Prom Night in Mississippi starts out pedestrian enough with a simple premise and numerous talking heads. While it is engaging and well produced, I didn’t expect a lot from it. Simply another ‘civil-rights-history-making-moment movie. To my surprise I was crying near uncontrollably by the end.

Most of us involved in entertainment to one degree or another feel after a short while that we have seen it all. We understand the world through Urban lenses and assume it is representative of the majority that is, or should be, plus or minus. Director Paul Saltzman has taken a small event in 2008, in the shadow of the historic presidential campaign of Barak Obama, and turned it into a statement on how far we have come and how far we still have to go as a people and as a nation.

In many ways, Prom Night in Mississippi is more of a milepost on the state of race relations in America in 2008 than the presidential election. More telling than all the urban reality dramas in theater, television and movie house put together, it holds up a mirror that cannot be ignored. It busts stereotypes and enforces them, reveals the erosion of time on tradition and of youth on rigidity. PNIM is a carefully edited and powerful film that builds momentum through three distinct acts, explodes into a low key finale and takes your breath away. A societal close up unlike most others, it answers the question, “What is an American?” This is a must see for EVERY high school senior class…and their parents. Five stars. Don’t miss it.