dir Kasi Lemmons - The ghost of Tennessee Williams hovers over Eve's Bayou. The action takes place in a moss-draped Louisiana backwater, and the family under observation (in their big, gracious bayou house) is as ripe with desires, disappointments, and the mysterious scent of sex as any in Mr. Williams' neighbourhood. The story belongs to young Eve Batiste (Jurnee Smollett, from Jack). "The summer I killed my father, I was 10 years old," a grown-up Eve announces in a provocative prologue voice-over. But the drama that unfolds is far more shape-shifting than such an audience-grabbing statement can convey. Eve's father, Louis (Samuel L. Jackson), is a suave, popular doctor and gentle family man who's also a womanizer - a flaw that bedevils Eve's graceful mother (Lynn Whitfield) and torments Eve's older sister, Cisely (Meagan Good), who adores her daddy perhaps more than she should. Eve, meanwhile, worships her big sister. And in reaching out to support Cisely, Eve turns first to her father's sister, Aunt Mozelle (Debbi Morgan, in a blazing performance), a vibrant, enigmatic woman infused with good-witch spiritual powers, and then to Elzora (Diahann Carroll), a voodoo priestess with potent bad-witch abilities. Lemmons thus lays out big themes - the little seductions of fathers and daughters, the thick bonds between sisters, the power of dark and light spiritual intentions in the material world. But she covers any traces of "heaviness" with shimmering, dream-state visual elegance. (USA 1997) 110 min. AA. mature theme. Home | March Calendar | April Calendar | Cinema Info | Advertisers