Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

Critics Consensus

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

90%

Audience Score

User Ratings: 1,026

Super Reviewer

Rate this movie

Oof, that was Rotten.

Meh, it passed the time.

It’s good – I’d recommend it.

Awesome!

So Fresh: Absolute Must See!

What did you think of the movie? (optional)
You're almost there! Just confirm how you got your ticket.
Super Reviewer
Step 2 of 2

How did you buy your ticket?

Let's get your review verified.
Fandango

AMCTheatres.com or AMC AppNew

Enter your Ticket Confirmation# located in your email.More Info

Cinemark Coming Soon

We won’t be able to verify your ticket today, but it’s great to know for the future.

Regal Coming Soon

We won’t be able to verify your ticket today, but it’s great to know for the future.

Theater box office or somewhere else
By opting to have your ticket verified for this movie, you are allowing us to check the email address associated with your Rotten Tomatoes account against an email address associated with a Fandango ticket purchase for the same movie.
You're almost there! Just confirm how you got your ticket.
Super Reviewer

Rate this movie

Oof, that was Rotten.

Meh, it passed the time.

It’s good – I’d recommend it.

Awesome!

So Fresh: Absolute Must See!

What did you think of the movie? (optional)
How did you buy your ticket?
- Fandango
- AMCTheatres.com or AMC AppNew
  
  Enter your Ticket Confirmation# located in your email.More Info
- Cinemark Coming Soon
  
  We won’t be able to verify your ticket today, but it’s great to know for the future.
- Regal Coming Soon
  
  We won’t be able to verify your ticket today, but it’s great to know for the future.
- Theater box office or somewhere else
By opting to have your ticket verified for this movie, you are allowing us to check the email address associated with your Rotten Tomatoes account against an email address associated with a Fandango ticket purchase for the same movie.
You haven’t finished your review yet, want to submit as-is?

You can always edit your review after.
Are you sure?

Verified reviews are considered more trustworthy by fellow moviegoers.
Want to submit changes to your review before closing?

Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus Photos

Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus (2003)

View All Photos (13)

Movie Info

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.

Genre:

documentary
Original Language:

English (United Kingdom)
Director:

Andrew Douglas
Producer:

Andrew Douglas, Martin Rosenbaum
Release Date (Streaming):

Jan 27, 2015
Box Office (Gross USA):

$77.2K
Runtime:

1h 24m

Cast & Crew

David Johansen

Harry Crews

Johnny Dowd

David Eugene Edwards

Lee Sexton

Rennie Sparks

Show all Cast & Crew

Critic Reviews for Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

All Critics (34) | Top Critics (15) | Fresh (23) | Rotten (11)

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.

October 20, 2005 | Rating: B | Full Review…

Chris Vognar
Dallas Morning News
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.

October 7, 2005 | Rating: 3/4 | Full Review…

Michael Booth
Denver Post
A portrait of rural America as beautiful as it is bizarre.

August 12, 2005 | Rating: 3.5/4 | Full Review…

Jeff Shannon
Seattle Times
Brooding, often beautiful tone poem of a documentary.

August 7, 2005 | Rating: 3/5

Sheri Linden
Boxoffice Magazine
Douglas has crafted a beautifully shot and edited film that treats its subjects fairly.

July 29, 2005 | Rating: 3/4 | Full Review…

G. Allen Johnson
San Francisco Chronicle
A hit-and-miss experience.

July 28, 2005 | Rating: 2.5/4 | Full Review…

Jeff Strickler
Minneapolis Star Tribune
To say the film lingers in the mind like a nightmare is not to say it is unpleasant.

March 1, 2007 | Full Review…

Eric Monder
Film Journal International
The music was fine; the tour was suspect.

May 29, 2006 | Rating: C+ | Full Review…

Dennis Schwartz
Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
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.

May 5, 2006 | Rating: B | Full Review…

Eric D. Snider
EricDSnider.com
Calling this a documentary is a bit of a misnomer, as Douglas splices staged music numbers into his travelogue footage to paint his surreal homage to the Deep South

February 10, 2006 | Rating: B- | Full Review…

John A. Nesbit
Old School Reviews
The stories, usually told by white men, grow banal, and the richness of White's world increasingly seems limited in scope . . . seems racially myopic.

January 21, 2006

Brian Gibson
Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Alberta)
White says you can't really understand the South if its not in your blood, and he's probably right. But the film does an admirable job trying to give us a transfusion.

November 10, 2005 | Rating: 3/4

Rob Thomas
Capital Times (Madison, WI)