Black Snake Moan

Review by Mark Bennett

Rae (Christina Ricci) is twenty-something white-trash girl from Tennessee. She has serious emotional issues that manifest themselves in an ugly, pathological nymphomania.

When her boyfriend Ronnie (Justin Timberlake) heads overseas to serve in the army, her psychological problems come to head in a bender of drugs and sex.

Ronnie’s supposed friend, Gill (Michael Raymond-James), drives Rae home with a view to taking advantage of her, but when she makes fun of his manhood, he bashes her and leaves her unconscious on back road.

Lazarus (Samuel L Jackson) is a black farmer and former musician whose wife has walked out on him to be with his brother. It’s one more torment added to the hell his life has become and he is headed down his own path of self-destruction until he finds Rae sprawled out on the road near his property.

Nursing her back to health, he begins to suspect the abuse and neglect that caused her mental illness and she becomes his ‘project’ – and an excuse to ignore his own problems. He even goes so far as to chain her up in his house so she cannot continue in her self-harming ways.

From there, these two damaged souls begin an unlikely journey of healing, friendship and redemption. With the aid of Lazarus’ preacher friend RL (John Cothran Jr), they gradually face down the demons that have poisoned their pasts.

Some of the more reserved critics will say this film is gratuitous and demeaning to women; certainly the journalist who walked out of the screening I attended will.

Don’t believe them.

Such elitist snobs want to pretend these sorts of folks don’t exist, but of course they do – and director Craig Brewer is not afraid to show them in the raw.

The result is two complex characters that we accept in spite of the occasional implausibility and the screenplay’s heavy religious symbolism.

Both Jackson and Ricci are astonishing in roles that offer myriad acting challenges, while the cinematography and pacing are well considered and keep the story moving along. The entwining of blues music as both a soundtrack and a character is ambitious, but that also comes off.

If Black Snake Moan has a weak point it is Timberlake, who has a smallish but crucial part and can’t quite match the lofty standards his co-stars set (and his southern accent comes and goes like the tide).

To make a rather impudent comparison, Black Snake Moan is like Driving Miss Daisy pumped full of sex, drugs and profanity – the tarnished side of the same penny.

Those who are not offended at the drop of a hat will find an original and compelling character study without the pretension prevalent in many indie films featuring big name stars. 

Black Snake Moan is a worthwhile viewing experience.

4 out of 5

Black Snake Moan
Australian release: 2nd August, 2007
Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Christina Ricci, Justin Timberlake, John Cothran Jr, Michael Raymond-James
Director: Craig Brewer
Website: Click here.