Movie Review: Black Snake Moan

Black Snake Moan (2007) 

Directed by Craig Brewer 

Written by Craig Brewer

Starring Samuel L. Jackson, Christina Ricci, Justin Timberlake

Release Date March 2nd, 2007

Published March 2nd, 2007

Craig Brewer's debut film Hustle and Flow was a sweat soaked tale of redemption as memorable for its musical conceit, southern fried hip hop, as for its dirty south setting. His follow up mines some of the same elements but with a great deal less success. Black Snake Moan is a similarly sweat soaked tale of redemption. Replacing hip hop with some old school blues, Black Snake Moan also has the musical conceit down.

So why does Hustle and Flow succeed and Black Snake Moan fail? High camp. Where Hustle and Flow could be taken seriously, even with it's pimps and ho's, Black Snake Moan is too balls out goofy in it's nympho plus bluesman equals redemption tale.

It's a concept so bizarre it's difficult to describe. A nymphomaniac (Christina Ricci) is depressed over her boyfriend (Justin Timberlake) having left for the military. So, she heads out for a night of hardcore debauchery. The next morning she is found beaten and unconscious on the side of a dirt road not far from the home of a bluesman turned farmer (Samuel L. Jackson).

How that leads to the nympho being chained to the bluesman's radiator is part of the overall kink of Black Snake Moan; another meta southern fantasy from writer-director Craig Brewer whose talent for recreating the southern milieu of mid-seventies southern exploitation films make him either the Quentin Tarentino of the southern drive in or a redneck Roger Corman. It depends on how much you like the story he's telling.

I loved the way he told the story of a pimp becoming a rapper in Hustle and Flow. That movie used the sweat soaked southern setting to put its characters in a pressure cooker environment that imitated the pressure each felt about turning their lives around. At times the pimp game stuff seemed a little too blaxploitation and not enough true story, but for the most part it worked.

Black Snake Moan is almost entirely an exploitation flick. Violent, creepy and yet somehow kind of sexy, Black Snake Moan trains its lecherous camera eye on Christina Ricci's panty and half shirt clad form, with a chain around her waist and milks it for all the kinky exploitation it can wring from such a scenario and not be accused of being porn.

And then the old time religion kicks in and the movie goes off in another goofy direction. Craig Brewer's direction of Black Snake Moan is as assured and evocative as anything he did in Hustle and Flow. The difference comes from the goofball story being told. Hustle and Flow created its own sweat soaked southern reality. Black Snake Moan evokes a Hollywood style southern culture by way of the goofy southern exploitation flicks of the 1970's.

You have to respect the bravery of Ms. Ricci for taking on such a complicated role. Though her performance is an utter disaster, she is at the very least highly committed to the part of a white trash sex fiend. It's a courageous and sexy performance but the character is entirely untenable. She is not necessarily redeemed and her character has little recognizable arc.

Samuel L. Jackson's bluesman is the more interesting and complex character. Surprisingly reserved and uncertain for a Samuel L. Jackson character, Lazarus makes decisions from moment to moment and often out of a quiet rage. That rage erupts rarely but when it does you get just a glimpse of the usual Sam Jackson; badass histrionics. This is a well measured and unique performance for Jackson, the best thing about an otherwise execrable film.

Black Snake Moan is southern fried dopey. Soft core porn on a Hollywood budget and with a much better soundtrack. I had hoped for something with a little more depth from Craig Brewer after his deft, quick witted debut. The filmmaking is strong; it's the storytelling that has suffered. Craig Brewer is too smart and too talented for such a shallow effort as Black Snake Moan.