Welcome to Retro Rewind, the TGJ original feature launched to celebrate TV and cinema’s brightest moments.

Today, almost twenty years after its arrival, we revisit the stellar African-American movie ‘Eve’s Bayou‘.

In it, Jurnee Smollett, Samuel L. Jackson, Meagan Good, Diahann Carroll and Lynn Whitfield pull viewers through a maze of magic, memory and murder to tell the story of a young girl who places a curse on her father when she discovers his involvement in something sinister.

However, all may not be as it seems.

‘Eve’s Bayou’ below…

The movie stood tall as the directorial debut of the director Kasi Lemmons and earned $14 million at the box office following its release on November 7th 1997.

The New York Times had this to say about it, and Jackson’s performance, following its release:

Every element of the film — from the turbulent, stormy performances to the rich cinematography (which includes black-and-white computer-enhanced dream sequences) to the setting itself, in which the thick layers of hanging moss over muddy water seem to drip with sexual intrigue and secrecy — merges to create an atmosphere of extraordinary erotic tension and anxiety.

 

Mr. Jackson has never played a character quite this avid. And in a performance that requires him to infuse the role of perfect father and dream lover with a demonic charge, Mr. Jackson makes Louis at once irresistibly lovable and slightly terrifying.

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