Southern Discomfort

Black Snake Moan

Grade: C

A nymphomaniacal sex abuse survivor (Christina Ricci) gets thrown out of a truck one night by a redneck. The next morning a blues musician/farmer (Samuel L. Jackson) finds her lying half-naked in the road and, after minimal deliberation, decides to chain her to his radiator to cleanse her of her wicked ways. Depending on your point of view, Craig Brewer's follow-up to his hit film Hustle & Flow is either a harmless guilty pleasure or a big ol' slice of Southern fried horseshit with toxic traces of misanthropy and misogyny. Suffice it to say that I won't eat here again any time soon.

Jackson takes his role and runs with it despite the limitations of the hammy script. But Ricci - despite some impressive emissions of rage - fails to strike a convincing balance between Girl Gone Wild and Little Girl Lost. In case you're wondering, Justin Timberlake sucks big time as Ricci's anxiety-ridden beau.

Opens nationwide on March 2.