Wednesday

There were no adverts or trailers preceding Black Snake Moan. This disturbed me. And I was right to be disturbed. This is an unusual film. Not in a formal sense, the narrative was straightforward and simple, but in the content of that narrative. A man (Samuel L. Jackson), who has just separated from his wife, finds a young girl (Christina Ricci) lying on the side of the road, beaten up and abused. She is, as they say, a lady who is free with her affection. The man decides to chain her up in his house and teach her to be a better person. This sounds quite dynamic, which is why I saw it, but there is something missing. I never really sympathised with either character. The script doesn't have that edge that it needs. The performances are good, but not stunning. The relationship between Ricci and Jackson should be exciting, but they don't really interact that well. Perhaps my problems stem from what this film is supposedly derived from: the 1970s exploitation pictures. I don't think I've ever seen such a picture. This film is also slightly descended from Tarantino (certain lines sound very similar to some from Pulp Fiction), but it doesn't pastiche movies in the way he does. It is more of a straight run through of the conventions, a lot like The Good German. In a way, I think they should have been more outrageous with the odd things about this movie, gone way over the top and never reined themselves in. I don't think this is a good film, but it's more interesting than a lot else out there. The blues soundtrack (occasionally played by Jackson himself) is brilliant, but might get annoying if you don't have a disposition for liking it anyway - which I do. And for some reason Christina Ricci is starting to look like Goldie Hawn. Watching the trailer will give you a good idea of the strangeness of this movie, although it has a more comedic tone than I think the complete film does.