Last night it was movie night and after going over the selection we decided on Black Snake Moan starring Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Ricci.

I had seen the trailer awhile back and thought that it looked interesting with some strong acting so we finally got around to seeing it.

Samuel L. Jackson is a broken-down blues musician and vegetable market gardener whose wife has just walked out. On the road leading to his property he finds the battered body of a young white girl, whose injuries hardly seem curable by the cough syrup he gets at the local drugstore. The girl is Rae (Christina Ricci); and Lazarus (Jackson) determines to return her from near death one way or the other.

This was an interesting way to portray prostitution and redemption in a movie and it is no surprise that the director Craig Brewer also made Hustle & Flow.

Both Black Snake Moan and Hustle & Flow are about neglected characters living on the fringe who find a healing in each other. Both movies use a great deal of music to illustrate the souls of their characters.

The soundtrack was so good that 10 minutes after the movie I was on the net hunting for it.

One interesting note that I did not know going in was that Justin Timberlake was in it as Rae’s boyfriend. He showed some more acting skills and seems to get that taking small, interesting parts is the way to build an acting career, ok forget Shrek 3.

I read that Jackson considers this his best performance. Well it is certainly up there from what I have seen. He disappears into the role, and a good performance requires his energy and intensity. As for Christina Ricci, she is the right actor for this role; she fit the poor, mixed-up creature and lets you experience both her pain and her hope. The only downside was it made me think of Nicole Richie way too much. Oh well such is life.

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