Quarantine Black Movie Marathon Day 1: Eve's Bayou
Jurnee Smollett-Bell and Samuel L. Jackson in Eve’s Bayou (1997)
Hello again,
Yesterday, I started a marathon of black films to watch during self-isolation. These are all movies I haven’t seen before and I’ll be writing and talking about them every day until I decide I want to stop. The reviews on my blog will be SPOILER FREE but feel free to chat spoiler talk in the comments.
Last night I watched the first film in my marathon, Eve’s Bayou. Eve’s Bayou was written and directed by Kasi Lemmons and released in 1997 (my birth year!) . The film stars Samuel L. Jackson, Lynn Whitfield, Meagan Good, Diahann Carroll, and Jurnee Smollett-Bell as Eve. The film follows a wealthy black family living in the Louisiana bayou in 1962 and the aftermath of Eve catching her father cheating on her mother.
This is a film you have to sit and think about for a while. I felt a lot of emotions while watching this film— bouncing from glee to anger to discomfort to nostalgia to reflection. At it’s surface, this is a tale of romantic conflict, coming-of-age, and the teetering balance between happiness and trauma in family life. That alone would make a complex, engaging, and rounded story; however, there is so much more to this film. Lemmon’s dives deep into our relationship to land, to ancestry, to memory. People always talk about directors using their setting as a character, but Lemmon’s relationship with the bayou is one of collaboration and shared breath— not creation.
The acting in this film is impressive— especially coming from the children (specifically Jurnee Smollett-Bell and Meagan Good). Often, good performances from children come with this intense sense of polish. Watching performances such as Natalie Portman’s in Leon: the Professional you get a sense that, even at 13, she knew she was practicing a craft. This is not a bad thing— that performance holds incredible depth. But in Eve’s Bayou, there are moments of uncertainty. Eve’s voice changes, she laughs a little too loud. They are quick and not really noticeable, but impact the whole mood of the film in a way that is really hard to describe but ultimately great.
Basically, this movie is completely up my ally. The beauty of the landscape, the gorgeous costuming, the hints of magic. If you were to describe it to me without me knowing anything about it I would probably say that it sounds like the perfect movie. But this film also made me uncomfortable— especially towards its climax. While watching, the discomfort turned my off a little. The handling of certain topics felt hard edged. There are so many movies now and days where I leave the theater thinking along the lines of, “wow, they handled that hard topic so well— there was so much nuance.” This movie did not let you have the comfort of being able to analyze clearly what is right, what is wrong, what is misguided, what is ignorant. It assaults you with the issue, filled with fractures and complications that can’t be explained away through any kind of theory, then ends.
The final lines of this film are spoken by an invisible narration of an older Eve:
“But the truth changes color, depending on the light. And tomorrow can be clearer than yesterday. Memory is the selection of images, some elusive, others printed indelibly on the brain. Each image is like a thread, each thread woven together to make a tapestry of intricate texture. And the tapestry tells a story, and the story is our past.”
After these words are spoken, the camera slowly zooms out to reveal the calm, pinkish bayou that surrounds Eve and her sister until they are simply part of the landscape— forcing you to sit there not knowing how you feel about what just happened but also weirdly in awe at how much there is to feel.
Some additional random thoughts
Lynn Whitfield is the most beautiful woman. full stop.
THE MIRRORS
Meagan Good’s overbite is so cute and so perfect for this movie
why does Vondie Curtis-Hall look like a man on the cover of a romance novel named something like “A Gentle Nightmare”
this movie’s opening is *chef’s kiss*
is it just me or does the front of their house look like it was built in 2006?
Thanks for reading today’s review! Tonight I’ll be watching the 1972 blaxploitation horror classic, Blacula. Has anyone seen it before? Thoughts on Eve’s Bayou? Let me know in the comments or on my social media and give me suggestions for films to watch!!
See you soon,
Sofia
