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Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

Play trailer Poster for Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus 2005 1h 24m Documentary Play Trailer Watchlist
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68% Tomatometer 34 Reviews 90% Popcornmeter 1,000+ Ratings
Traveling through the American South, documentarian Andrew Douglas trains his lens on Jim White, an alternative-country musician, as he performs in venues that range in variety from churches to coal mines. During this journey, White shares his experience of growing up in the Deep South, while Douglas interviews a number of other Southern musicians, artists and writers, attempting to gain a perspective on a unique culture that is often overlooked.
Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

What to Know

Critics Consensus

This atmospheric tour of the Deep South is both quirky and lovely.

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Critics Reviews

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Chris Vognar Dallas Morning News 10/20/2005
B
The soundtrack, which includes Lee Sexton, The Handsome Family and others, is full of haunting Southern sounds; the camera work is inventive; and the interviews give you an off-center sense of place that equals at least one aspect of the South. Go to Full Review
Michael Booth Denver Post 10/07/2005
3/4
Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus is one of those movie-long non sequiturs where, though one thought does not logically follow another, we know what is meant. Go to Full Review
Jeff Shannon Seattle Times 08/12/2005
3.5/4
A portrait of rural America as beautiful as it is bizarre. Go to Full Review
Eric Monder Film Journal International 03/01/2007
To say the film lingers in the mind like a nightmare is not to say it is unpleasant. Go to Full Review
Dennis Schwartz Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews 05/29/2006
C+
The music was fine; the tour was suspect. Go to Full Review
Eric D. Snider EricDSnider.com 05/05/2006
B
It's a slow, ponderous film -- too slow and too ponderous, maybe -- but an intriguing one, often funny, sometimes unnerving, and altogether hard to forget. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Stephen C @bob25009 Jul 19 Real footage in 1 hour and 24 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In British English with American English subtitles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The USA grossed over $77,200.00!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! See more 08/30/2013 Pretentious horse shit See more 01/07/2012 Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus is a narrow minded view of the American south as seen through the eyes of pseudo hipsters. This "documentary" includes some beautiful imagery of southern landscapes but ruins it with useless dialogue and staged interviews. See more 11/12/2011 The music is amazing. See more 01/18/2011 At its best, the music documentary can bring the best out of its subject like Woodstock or Chet Baker in Let's Get Lost. It can also illuminate indulgence in its subject like Metallica's Some Kind of Monster. Usually, the music biopic treats someone or a genre as its central character but in Andrew Douglas' mesmerising Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus, music plays a strangely peripheral role but one which the film could not function without. The main character is the American South and our guide is Jim White, a bluesman who has had not a little success around the globe but who we learn feels his real home is the south, a place where he feels close to God. As a largely lapsed Christian country, some British viewers may choose to judge the 'cast' of this documentary as evangelical nut-jobs but with the genial White for company, we feel strangely empathic to the men and women who give their lives completely and totally to god. Well, when they're not out drinking, dancing and shouting. This is a complex south, part True Blood, part Badlands but with religion running through its core. Music comes with blues and country singing contemporaries of White who perform in strange locations throughout the film's journey and they emphasise the hold that tradition has on these people. The film is warm yet haunting at the same time and all our emotions seem to be channelled through White as he asks nothing of us but merely to observe, we can even judge if we want. By the end, we judge kindly and are still humming long after the credits have rolled. See more 08/15/2010 This is an elliptic but fascinating and probably educational (not to mention nice to look at and listen to) "documentary" about southern life and culture. It is one of those films that is just so unique that you can't really compare it to anything else. Almost like an Errol Morris movie. See more Read all reviews
Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

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Movie Info

Synopsis Traveling through the American South, documentarian Andrew Douglas trains his lens on Jim White, an alternative-country musician, as he performs in venues that range in variety from churches to coal mines. During this journey, White shares his experience of growing up in the Deep South, while Douglas interviews a number of other Southern musicians, artists and writers, attempting to gain a perspective on a unique culture that is often overlooked.
Director
Andrew Douglas
Producer
Andrew Douglas, Martin Rosenbaum
Screenwriter
Steve Haisman
Genre
Documentary
Original Language
British English
Release Date (Theaters)
Mar 14, 2005, Original
Release Date (DVD)
Jan 27, 2015
Box Office (Gross USA)
$77.2K
Runtime
1h 24m