Just perfect...

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

"Eve's Bayou" is riveting and captivating, leaving the audience engaged at every turn and begging for more of these characters by the end. In an almost dream-like Louisiana setting, Eve's Bayou provides an cinematic orgasm of eyes and mind. We are taken on a journey by a young Eve (Jurnee Smollett) and we get to see the summer in her life when tragedy dismantled her innocence and essentially revealed devastating secrets about her beloved father. The story is filled with secrets, lies, truths, love, and a complicated sibling rivalry. Eve's relationship with sister Cicly( Megan Good) is typical for girls. Both share a deep love for their father(Samuel L. Jackson) and compete for his affection. Cicly is the average teenaged girl who is struggling with becoming a woman while fighting to keep her family together and her father happy. While she adores her father, she begrudges her mother, Roz(Lynn Whitfield), showing us the electra complex at its best. The beautiful Roz is struggling with her failed marriage and disobedient children and becomes nervous from all the stress.While this movie is packed with an all star cast (Lynn Whitfield, Jurnee Smollet, Samuel L. Jackson, Lisa Nicole Carson, Megan Good,and Diahann Carroll) the star of this film is definitely Debbi Morgan. Her portrayal as the psychic counselor/black widow sister of Louis (Samuel L. Jackson) is her best role yet. Her performance in this film rivals that of great black actresses like Angela Bassett, Whoopi Goldberg, and Halle Barry. She really becomes Mozelle Batiste and we totally forget that she is a staple of cheesy daytime soap operas playing Angela Baxter of the famous black super-couple Angie and Jesse of All My Children. The scene when she describes the killing of her husband by a lover is amazing. I have watched it over and over again and I plan to watch many more times because she really is capable of fully pulling you in. The chemistry between Debbi and Jurnee is amazing and they make for a amazing duo on screen. They are such similar characters and its a shame that both were cheated out of Oscar nominations for this masterpiece. Debbi Morgan became my favorite actress the day I saw this film and I also look forward to seeing more from Kasi Lemmons. This is the best movie that I have seen in years (maybe ever) and is deserves to be on any list of the top films.Overall rating: 9 out of 10.

The story is set in 1962 Louisiana. The Batiste family is headed by charming doctor Louis (Sam Jackson). Though he is married to beautiful Roz, he has a weakness for attractive female patients. One night Louis trysts with married and sexy Metty Mereaux, not knowing that he is observed by his youngest daughter Eve, who is there by accident.The film received overwhelmingly positive reviews, with Chicago Sun-Times' Roger Ebert naming it the best film of 1997. Despite the praise, it seems to have been largely forgotten, and did not merit a single Oscar nomination that year. Going in to the picture today (2016), I had never heard of it, nor did I have a clue what it was about.The best part of this movie is that you can never be sure how much is real. Because most of it is told through the eyes of a 10-year old, some things may be misunderstood or distorted. A second viewing might be helpful.

One of 1997's great films and winner of the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature, the American indie opened to wide critical acclaim. Delicate and complex, it's not only a showcase for great acting but also a deeply affecting film about family, loneliness , and the line between right and wrong.Directed by Kasi Lemmons, who's worked mostly as an actress. ''Eve's Bayou'' is inspiring with its look at the resilience of the human spirit and the ways in which truth can clarify, transcend and redeem a broken life. Like Jim Sheridan's ''My Left Foot,'' ''Eve's Bayou'' delivers a full emotional palette without undue sentimentalizing.Although Debbi Morgan and Jurnee Smollet are stunning -- and are the highlights, the rest of the cast is equally powerful -- particularly Lynn Whitfield, Samuel L. Jackson all charming and powerful as Louis, and Meagan Good, rebellious yet complex as Cisely. There would be no great acting if the incredible screenplay weren't in tact. At the very least, Lemmons deserved an original screenplay nod. "Eve's Bayou" currently sits at # 24 in my Top 50 Films of the 90s. It's truly a great film that didn't the recognition it deserved (i.e. Academy Award nominations), so don't let it pass you by -- buy the Special Edition DVD.

A family drama like no other, Kasi Lemmons' "Eve's Bayou" is a bleak, mesmerizing rhapsody of family-destruction, defiantly uninterested in peddling Hollywood-style uplift. Lemmons doesn't pretend, and I won't either, that this movie is for everybody. But anyone who cares about ravishing film-making, superb acting and art willing to dive into the mystery of family's secrets will leave this dark drama both shaken and invigorated.This film simply works as a character study, pitilessly well observed and intimately familiar with its terrain. Mrs. Lemmons based her film on a previous short film she'd made. She describes the film as a semi-portrait of her own family. Although is it quite a heavy film, "Eve's Bayou" is far less dolorous than might be expected.