Black Snake Moan

Aroview: Christina Ricci stars as a scrawny, Southern-fried nympho whose demons get her deep into trouble in the deep, deep South the minute her doting sweetheart (Justin Timberlake) ships out to Iraq.

Drunk, raped, beaten and left by the roadside, she's discovered by Samuel L Jackson - a wronged bluesman - who chains her to his radiator and feeds her a down-home diet of soul food, scripture and the blues to save her from her own, messed-up li'l self.

Both leads sweat blood in their raw, relentless performances and writer/director Craig Brewer (HUSTLE AND FLOW) plays it David Lynch-straight. The result? The film transcends both the lurid exploitation at its core and any potential for tedious genre irony to become a heartily OTT melodrama of mutual redemption.

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