Black Snake Moan (2006) **1/2

Rating: 6/10 (21 July 2007)

I rented this expecting some sort of sleazy sexploitation craziness from straight out of the late 60s or early 70s, but that turned out to be false advertising. All the same, I mostly came away with an appreciation for what turned out to be a pretty good drama by the time it was all over. Samuel L. Jackson was very good as an old former blues musician and now truck driving farmer named Lazarus, whose wife leaves him for a more exciting life. One day he finds a young woman (Christina Ricci) beaten up and lying in the road and he takes her back to his shack to try and nurse her back to health. The girl is a local nymphomaniac with an uncontrollable need for sex, and who's slept with just about every man who crosses her path. Lazarus believes he can help "cast the devil from her" and find his own salvation through his deeds. At first it's difficult to care much for this callous and bitchy slut, but as the film progresses we learn the root of her troubles and, partly due to Ricci's good performance, we become invested in her character and even begin to sympathize somewhat. Justin Timberlake, I almost hate to say, is decent in this as Ricci's spineless and anxiety-suffering boyfriend, who goes off to the military but is sent back due to his nervous condition. The movie also offers some fairly good music here as well. While watching the deleted scenes on the DVD later on, I felt that many of them would have benefited this film, and director Craig Brewer might have done better to leave them intact. He would have had a much better movie. **1/2 out of ****