Word: filming
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Hollywood to become a TV star. It's a typical theme for a movie: carpe diem, no matter who you kill or how many lives you ruin. But set the plot during the turbulent time period of the '60s Civil Rights Movement, and the scope of the film becomes much wider and far more serious than its trailer suggests...
...film is told from the point of view of Peejoe (Lucas Black), Lucille's nephew, who is both Lucille's confidante about the grisly murder of her husband and also the sole witness to the killing of Taylor Jackson (Louis Miller Jr.), the young black leader of a sit-in at a public pool. Peejoe, demonstrating a wisdom that belies his age, refuses to take part in the racisim and segregation that is the rule in his narrow-minded town; however, his principles are sorely tested when he is forced to make a choice between his filial and moral obligations...
...inconsequential. Rather, her selfish and fantasy-like dreams are used to provide a stark contrast to the very real issues of hypocrisy, corruption and racism of the Deep South. What masquerades as the main plot is therefore secondary to the historical drama that is actually the crux of this film. While the plot isn't exactly complex, the dual storyline results in a movie that is, at times, as confused and discombobulated as its airheaded main character. The insanity of the fairy-tale outcome of Lucille's story undermines the seriousness of the racism and corruption of the Alabama town...
...other hand, the delicate nature of the film is handled better than one might expect for the directorial debut of Antonio Banderas, whose roles in recent films like Desperado and Mask of Zorro have not exactly demonstrated oodles of sensitivity. While Crazy in Alabama has its redeeming qualities and moments of comic relief (provided by a temperamental court judge and a talking head), its non sequitur scene sequence leaves one feeling a bit unsettled, but certain of one thing: tupperware sure keeps its contents fresh...
...Emerson spoke, leaders of the Harvard Islamic Society and Muslim Law Students Association gathered to distribute flyers vilifying Emerson's character, accusing him of racism and seeking to tie him to the presumably nefarious forces of "Israeli intelligence." One woman distributing material informed me matter-of-factly, "Emerson's film has already been discredited." In fact, the film has been enthusiastically acclaimed in The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, and was awarded the prestigious George Polk Award for journalistic excellence...