Sex, salvation and vomit

>> Black Snake Moan is an enjoyably insane
tale of nymphomania and redemption

by MARK SLUTSKY

You can be pretty sure that there’ll not be another film this year like Black Snake Moan. Director Craig Brewer’s follow-up to his Southern rap sensation Hustle & Flow is a tale of sex, sin, salvation and the dirty South; it features electric blues, OxyContin, Justin Timberlake and a half-naked Christina Ricci chained to a radiator. It’s over-the-top and totally preposterous, but, amazingly, very entertaining and, if not really affecting, at least engaging on an emotional level.

The movie starts with a one-two punch of sex and vomit, as young couple Ronnie and Rae (Timberlake and Ricci) go at it before Ronnie’s meant to ship out with the military. Prone to panic attacks, though, he’s soon heaving into the toilet, and that mixture of passion and violent sickness pretty much sums up the movie. Bereft of her man, the unstable Ricci goes into a nymphomaniacal tailspin, culminating in a night of partying (and violence at the hands of her boyfriend’s best friend) that leaves her bloodied and beaten at the side of the road.

Enter Samuel L. Jackson. A lonely farmer and ex-bluesman who’s just been left by his wife, Jackson takes Ricci home and tries to take care of the crazily delirious girl. And not just physically—he aims to take care of her salvation too. To that end, he shackles her to his radiator until her demons can be exorcised.

How this turns into a good film I can’t really explain, but it does. Jackson is great, and while he’s been in his share of turkeys, Brewer knows how to use his bombast perfectly; after all, this is more or less an exploitation movie. Ricci is, well, in the words of the woman sitting next to me at the screening, “she’s like a little animal!” Her Rae is wild-eyed, almost feral, screaming and writhing in her cut-off t-shirt and underwear. Really, you won’t see another performance like it any time soon. It’s astoundingly nutso.

By the time Jackson whips out the guitar and saves her soul with his electric blues while lightning crashes around them, things have gotten even more ludicrous. But it’s Brewer’s willingness to go beyond the outrageous that makes Black Snake Moan such an unlikely and enjoyable movie.

BLACK SNAKE MOAN OPENS
THIS FRIDAY, MARCH 2

>> Movie Listings