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Eve's Bayou

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Eve's Bayou (1997)

November. 07,1997
|
7.2
|
R
| Drama
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Summer heats up in rural Louisiana beside Eve’s Bayou, 1962, as the Batiste family tries to survive the secrets they’ve kept and the betrayals they’ve endured.

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Reviews

Listonixio
1997/11/07

Fresh and Exciting

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Kaelan Mccaffrey
1997/11/08

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

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Mathilde the Guild
1997/11/09

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

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Marva
1997/11/10

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

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billcr12
1997/11/11

Kasi Lemmons wrote and directed "Eve's Bayou," with such precision that I'm astounded that she hasn't had anything as good since this feature. Orson Welles is still famous for "Citizen Kane" after which he never reached such heights again.Samuel L. Jackson is a doctor who has a monogamy problem, constantly cheating on his wife, played by Lynn Whitfield. They have two daughters, Eve of the title, Jurnee Smollett is awesome as the lead character of this story and her sister Cisely(Meagan Good) is also a charming child actress. The two worship their father but they eventually discover his shortcomings as a husband.The two young sisters steal this film, an absorbing, tragic family drama of Shakespearean proportions. Lemmons has created a memorable classic.

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prop03
1997/11/12

This film is now showing on cable here in Australia, and is a far better than average offering.Written and directed by Kasi Lemmons, the film is a powerful family drama set in the sixties in the south of the USA. It stars Samuel L Jackson as a small town doctor with a wandering eye. The story is told from the viewpoint of his middle child, Eve, wonderfully played by Jurnee Smollett, who sees her middle-class family life threatened by her father's infidelities.No tale set in a bayou village could exist without references to black magic and voodoo, and this film also has them as a rather central part of the plot. But these elements are handled skilfully and believably, and heighten the tension that develops.One of the interesting tools used by Lemmons is to tell and retell a story from different characters' perspectives, asking the viewer to determine which is more truthful, and indeed, whether the truth is paramount.Jackson gives a sparkling performance as Dr Louis Batiste, a man of warmth and generosity who is well regarded by the local community that he serves. His family is seemingly a happy and close one, until the children begin to question some of the adult behaviour they witness.Jurnee Smollett's Eve is the main protagonist around whom much of the story is centred, and she effortlessly moves back and forth between being a precocious brat and a young woman with powerful emotions. The rest of the cast is also very good, including a voluptuous Lisa Nicole Carson as the temptress Mattie Mereaux, and Diahann Carroll as a bayou witch.This film moves along at a good pace and is a little more than you might expect.

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eyeofmyangels
1997/11/13

Kasi Lemmons has invigorated and enriched her debut film, "Eve's Bayou", through the use of a thousand details, a strong sense of time and place, outstanding characterizations and a display of energy and cinematic flair that marks an advance on any other film released in 1997. Lemmons works with such piercing fervor and intelligence that "Eve's Bayou" just about transcends its tidy moral design."Eve's Bayou" is as good a compromise of fact and fiction as you could hope for -- and still call it a movie. Lemmons directed this with a single-mindedness and attention to detail that makes it riveting. She doesn't make the mistake of adding cornball little subplots to popularize the material; she knows she has a great story, and she tells it with such realism that feels like we're apart of the Batiste family. This is a powerful story, one of 1997's best films, told with great clarity and acted like a finely tuned powerful fire(bravo Debbi Morgan).

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thescienceoftrouble
1997/11/14

Kasi Lemmons was at the peak of her powers with "Eve's Bayou," a compassionate, morally complex drama that stands easily alongside other 1997 greats, "The Sweet Hereafter" and "The Ice Storm," but may even surpass those films in showcasing the rich yield of the director's signature extended rehearsal process. Impeccably designed, skillfully inhabited story of an African American family in the early 1960s performed by a peerless cast highlighted by an outstanding turn from Debbi Morgan.While the drama is emotionally harrowing it's also riveting, profoundly affecting and observed with a real generosity of spirit. The film also benefits from a deeply rooted sense of time and place -- in the haunting bayou landscapes, beautiful living quarters and vivid colors of the meticulous production design and in the muted, wintry tones of Amy Vincent's poised, detached camera-work. Terrance Blanchard's sonorous string score adds greatly to the emotional texture.This is a must see, and sure to become a classic.

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