The Last White Knight

The Last White Knight is a documentary by Canadian filmmaker Paul Saltzman about his meetings with Delay de la Beckwith, son of Byron de la Beckwith, who assassinated Medgar Evers.[1] In the film, Saltzman also interviewed Harry Belafonte, Morgan Freeman and others active in the civil rights movement. Belafonte's line, “People tell me that things have changed. And yet, I don’t trust Mississippi", is a key line from the film.[2]

The film was inspired by Saltzman's first encounter with the younger de la Beckwith in the early 1960s and their discussions decades later, following the unsealing of the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission's archives, are the core of the film whose title comes from de la Beckwith's standing as the last member of his family involved with the Klan.[2][3][4]

The documentary screened at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival and the 2013 Boston Jewish Film Festival.[5][6]

  1. ^ "Klansman opens up to doc maker he attacked in 1964". CBC News. 2013-02-25.
  2. ^ a b "'The Last White Knight – Is Reconciliation Possible?' Moving Beyond Prejudice". movingbeyondprejudice.com. Retrieved 2023-02-22.
  3. ^ "Movie review: The Last White Knight: Is Reconciliation Possible?". thestar.com. 2013-01-31. Retrieved 2023-02-22.
  4. ^ "Feature: Reconciling with a Violent Klansman". Door County Pulse. 2019-03-01. Retrieved 2023-02-22.
  5. ^ "Film Review: "The Last White Knight" -- A Vision of Racism Perpetuated - The Arts Fuse". artsfuse.org/. Retrieved 2023-02-22.
  6. ^ Vlessing, Etan (2012-08-21). "Toronto 2012: Bernardo Bertolucci, Michael Winterbottom, Michael Haneke in Masters Lineup". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2023-02-22.