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Black snake moan - Samuel L Jackson, Christina Ricci, Justin Timberlake, Craig Brewer

Threat advisory: Guarded - General risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

Everything is hotter down south.

In a small Tennessee town, two unlikely souls are about to be lured together at the sticky crossroads between rage and love. Found lying on the side of the road, beaten and nearly dead, is Rae (Christina Ricci), a 22-year-old who has developed a reputation around town for having an insatiable “itch” for sex. Her rescuer is Lazarus (Samuel L Jackson), an ex-blues guitarist who has grown used to life's relentless strains of trouble and sorrow.

Desperate for a change himself, Lazarus holds Rae prisoner, and sets out to “cure” her of her wicked ways. But to get to the deep, dark bottom of Rae's mystery, Lazarus will first have to face the demons that reside in both their hearts, especially when Rae's one-true-love Ronnie (Justin Timberlake), a Guardsman who was supposed to be headed for Iraq, comes looking for her.

Against its Southern gothic background, Black snake moan unfolds in raw, revealing and ultimately transcendent shades of blue.

Theatrical propaganda posters

Target demographic movie keyword propaganda

Film drama Tennessee sex nymphomania love relationship blues mystery soldier white trash slut rape

Persons of interest

Samuel L Jackson .... Lazarus
Christina Ricci .... Rae
John Cothran Jr .... RL
Justin Timberlake .... Ronnie
S Epatha Merkerson .... Angela
David Banner .... Terrone
Bevan Bell .... Football Guy
Clare Grant .... Kell
Adriane Lenox .... Rose Woods
Jeff Pope .... Batson
Michael Raymond-James .... Gill
Leonard L Thomas .... Deke
Ruby Wilson .... Mayella
Craig Brewer .... Screenwriter
Craig Brewer .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

Black snake moan official movie site
Black snake moan film production notes
Black snake moan QuickTime movie trailers

Awards and film festivals:

Sydney Film Festival 2007: Screening

Studios and distributors:

Paramount Pictures

Intelligence analyst

Special Agent Matti

Theatrical report

With the themes and references and scenes and violence and language, Black snake moan is a difficult film to evaluate. Themes and references and scenes and violence and language distract the male and some female minds from the drama that's producing them, especially when Christina Ricci shows her tits. They're extra distracting.

Meanwhile, the drama is laid on with a trowel: true love, war, separation anxiety, promiscuity, racism, rape, abandonment, torture, imprisonment, religion... more drama than you can poke with a stick. And then there's the music. Samuel L Jackson reveals some hard-core blues ability - and you can't sing the blues until you've had them. Justin Timberlake and Christina Ricci make a great pair of white trash losers with more sex than sense. They have an air of innocence combined with worldly sexuality that would not be unsuited to Romeo and Juliet. The sense of impending doom saves Ronnie and Rae from being just another pair of fucked-up teenagers with the bad luck to be born in a shit hole like Buttfuck, Tennessee.

There's an all-pervading sense of wrongness that undercuts any attempt at happiness (until the happy-ish ending). This is a good thing. It shows that Yanks can actually understand how the world works (until the happy-ish ending). Then there's a happy-ish ending. It's happy because there's a wedding (all weddings are happy) but it's ish because weddings are just the chains with which we bind ourselves to another person.

I liked Black snake moan because I didn't expect it to be so dark or so dramatic but I still found it difficult to evaluate.

The drama movie Black snake moan is directed by Craig Brewer and stars Samuel L Jackson, Christina Ricci, Justin Timberlake.