Ghosts of Mississippi
1996 film by Rob Reiner
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. It is the final film for character actor Ramon Bieri.
Released by Sony Pictures Releasing on December 20, 1996, the film received mixed reviews from critics and grossed just $13.3 million against its $36 million budget. However, the performances of Goldberg and Woods were widely praised, with the latter earning a nomination for Best Supporting Actor at the 69th Academy Awards, along with a nomination for Best Makeup.
Plot
Medgar Evers, an African-American civil rights activist in Mississippi, was murdered outside his home on June 12, 1963, by Byron De La Beckwith, a white supremacist. De La Beckwith had been tried twice in the 1960s, with both trials ended in hung juries. Evers' widow, Myrlie Evers, tries 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 believes she has what it would take to bring De La Beckwith to trial again. Although most of the evidence from the old trial has disappeared, Bobby DeLaughter, an assistant District Attorney, decides to help her, regardless of being warned that it might hurt his political aspirations and despite the strain that it has caused in his marriage.
The public source identifies “Ghosts of Mississippi” as 1996 film by Rob Reiner. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Ghosts, Mississippi and film.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q997206. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1996, 1994, 1963 and 1989.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ghosts of Mississippi” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.