Natchez, Mississippi: a town of 15,000 that, for generations, has drawn tourists to its immaculately restored antebellum mansions, some hosted by hoop-skirted white matriarchs, for an experience dubbed “Pilgrimage.” As interest declines and questions arise about showcasing these regal estates with tall tales of the “Old South,” Natchez faces a reckoning — with a romanticized, sanitized historical narrative and the debt it owes to the descendants of slaves. Directed by Suzannah Herbert — a Memphis-born documentary filmmaker whose work focuses on the American South — NATCHEZ follows owners of historic plantations, local activists and politicians — and both white and African American tour guides — as they tell their ever-more conflicting versions of the town’s past, and of American history.
“NATCHEZ is less about the individuals and more about the histories they’re part of and the way they crash into one another. The real story is never what you see on the surface…. Maybe telling the whole story doesn’t mean living happily ever after, but at least it can mean being a little wiser.” —Alissa Wilkinson, New York Times “The documentary puts personalities to ideas; it teems with notable characters, spanning a range from righteous to indifferent to ignoble, who excel at speaking their minds and expressing their emotions when a camera is pointed at them.” —Richard Brody, New Yorker
