Upon learning of her two Golden Globe nominations - for best supporting actress in Mudbound, as well as for her song "Mighty River" written for the WWII-era drama - Mary J. Blige spoke with EW about her relationship with the movie. "I had no idea what was coming," Blige told the publication about the Dee Rees-directed film, "but I did know that it was a very important movie."
The adaptation of a 2009 novel by Hillary Jordan that tells the story of the relationship between a black and white family during the Jim Crow era was a must-do for Blige. "When I read the script, I was like, “This film is extremely important,” because it’s a film that has a silver lining in it. In these types of films, you never see love as the silver lining, and black people are never free," she said. "These black people were free, and everyone learned how to love each other. Everyone learned that they were exactly the same and that we had to figure a way out of this."