Unlikely as it sounds, Loving gets its title from a man named Richard Loving (Joel Edgerton), a white construction worker living in a mostly African-American rural community in Caroline County, Virginia, in the 1950s.
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When his girlfriend Mildred (Ruth Negga) falls pregnant, he proposes marriage and she accepts, though they're forced to travel to Washington to circumvent their state's anti-miscegenation laws.
After returning home, Richard and Mildred are arrested – the night raid on their property strongly recalls Midnight Special – and escape jail only by agreeing to leave Virginia for good.
But they return in secret, and further court battles ensue, with the unassuming pair caught up almost unwittingly in the momentum of the civil rights movement.
The film is the work of US writer-director Jeff Nichols in a style that gives a nod to Stephen Spielberg.