Comedy and drama take turns in this period piece based on a novel by Mark Childress. Peejoe (
Lucas Black), short for Peter Joseph, lives in a small Alabama town in 1965, at the height of the Civil Rights movement. He becomes involved with a group of black students protesting the town's racially segregated municipal swimming pool, leading to a protest that explodes into deadly violence. But Peejoe has gotten a crash course in standing your ground and following your own path from his free-spirited Aunt Lucille (
Melanie Griffith), who has killed her abusive husband and is headed for Hollywood, where she's convinced that television stardom awaits her. Crazy in Alabama marked the directorial debut of actor
Antonio Banderas; his supporting cast includes
Cathy Moriarty,
Elizabeth Perkins,
Rod Steiger,
Fannie Flagg, and Meat Loaf Aday. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide