Usher in Mardi Gras with these movies set in Louisiana

Unlike the 2006 box-office-bomb remake of the same name, the original “All the King’s Men” from 1949 was a massive success that garnered universal acclaim and seven Academy Award nominations, including wins for Best Picture, Best Actor (Broderick Crawford) and Best Supporting Actress (Mercedes McCambridge). In the film based on Robert Penn Warren’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book of the same name, Crawford plays Louisiana politician and eventual governor Willie Stark, with the film noir showcasing his ruthless rise and sudden fall from power.

Unlike the previous film, “Panic in the Streets” was actually shot on location in New Orleans and used numerous locals as actors — two things that were uncommon at the time, but were insisted upon by legendary director Elia Kazan. The film centers on a police captain (Paul Douglas) and a department of health officer (Richard Widmark) working to prevent the spread of a deadly epidemic. Zero Mostel and Jack Palance appear in supporting roles, with the latter making his big-screen debut in the Oscar-winning film.

When it comes to stories set specifically in New Orleans, “A Streetcar Named Desire” is easily one of the most popular. The film starred then-unknown actors Marlon Brandon, Karl Malden and Kim Hunter, who reprised their roles from the 1947 Broadway play of the same name written by Tennessee Williams. To inject some starpower, Jessica Tandy was replaced by Vivien Leigh in the role of Blanche DuBois, a Southern belle who loses her Mississippi home to creditors and moves to Louisiana to live with her sister Stella (Hunter) and Stella’s abusive husband, Stanley (Brando). Now a classic film, “A Streetcar Named Desire” won three Oscars — all acting honors for Leigh, Malden and Hunter.

Elvis starred in four films before he was drafted into the U.S. Army, and the last was the 1958 musical drama “King Creole.” In fact, Presley needed a deferment to finish filming. Nowadays an underrated credit in Elvis’ career, “King Creole” received universal praise upon its release, especially when it came to Presley’s performance as Danny Fisher, a high school dropout-turned-singer who gets caught in the middle of a war between gangsters.

Director Robert Aldrich was looking to capitalize on the success of “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?” (1962) by casting Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in another psychological thriller, but Crawford had to drop out and was replaced by Olivia de Havilland. (OK, it’s a bit more complicated than that thanks to the infamous Davis-Crawford feud, but we digress.) The result was the seven-time Oscar-nominated “Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte,” a film about an aging spinster (Davis) who fights to keep her mansion from being destroyed by the state — while also attempting to stop some old family secrets from getting exposed. The scenes at the Hollis Mansion were shot on location at The Houmas, also known as the Burnside Plantation, in Burnside, Louisiana.

In contrast to the exploitation films of the ‘70s, “Sounder” presented a more wholesome story of blacks in America, centering on a family of rural Louisiana sharecroppers struggling to make it in 1933 with the arrival of the Great Depression. Cicely Tyson, Paul Winfield and Kevin Hooks were all praised for their roles in the Martin Ritt drama, which was based on an award-winning William H. Armstrong novel and received four Oscar nominations: Best Picture, Actor (Windfield), Actress (Tyson) and Adapted Screenplay (Lonne Elder III).

A master sergeant (Adolph Caesar) is murdered at the fictitious Fort Neal, a segregated U.S. Army base in Louisiana, and Capt. Richard Davenport (Howard E. Rollins Jr.) is sent down to investigate — only to receive hostility and racism from everyone he encounters. Art Evans, Denzel Washington (in his breakout role), David Harris, David Alan Grier and Patti LaBelle co-star in the film, with Caesar and screenwriter Charles Fuller both receiving Academy Award nominations in addition to a Best Picture nod.

Three inmates break out of a New Orleans prison and into the Louisiana bayou in the 1986 Jim Jarmusch film “Down by Law.” But the black-and-white indie drama is less about the escape and more about the relationship between the three prisoners played by Tom Waits, John Lurie and Roberto Benigni (in his first non-Italian feature film role). “Down by Law” screened at Cannes, where it failed to win the Palme d’Or but still received a warm reception.

Dennis Quaid and Ellen Barkin showed some sizzling on-screen chemistry in the 1986 comedic thriller “The Big Easy,” with co-stars Ned Beatty and John Goodman rounding out the cast of notable names. Quaid, Beatty and Goodman play New Orleans police officers and Barkin a state district attorney, although the good guy/bad guy lines get blurred in the twists and turns of this acclaimed thriller written by Daniel Petrie Jr. and directed by Jim McBride.

“Sex, Lies, and Videotape” is more than just a movie about a small group of acquaintances in Baton Rouge and the complicated relationships between them. It was also the breakthrough directorial effort of Steven Soderbergh, the solidification of James Spader and Peter Gallagher as respected actors and the emergence of Andie MacDowell and Laura San Giacomo. After debuting at Cannes and winning the Palme d’Or, the FIPRESCI Prize and a Best Actor honor for Spader, “Sex, Lies, and Videotape” received heaps praise on the film festival circuit, especially for its star actresses. Humorously, San Giacomo actually had to threaten to leave her agency to accept the role of Cynthia in the indie drama, but she was eventually rewarded (and validated!) with a Golden Globe nomination.

Do we really need to say more than the fact that the cast of “Steel Magnolias” includes Sally Field, Dolly Parton, Shirley MacLaine, Julia Roberts, Daryl Hannah, Olympia Dukakis, Tom Skerritt, Sam Shepard and Dylan McDermott? Based on Robert Harling’s 1987 play of the same name, “Steel Magnolias” is a story of life, love and loss set (and shot!) in Natchitoches, Louisiana. At the Golden Globes, Sally Field earned a Best Actress nomination and Julia Roberts nabbed a Best Support Actress win, with the movie making nearly $100 million at the box office.

May-Alice Culhane (Mary McDonnell), a former soap star, is left paralyzed after getting hit by a taxi and decides to move away from New York City to live in her abandoned childhood home in Southwestern Louisiana. She scares away every home nurse until one named Chantelle (Alfre Woodard) sticks around and manages to break through May-Alice’s tough exterior, receiving some emotional support in return. “Passion Fish” had only a limited release but earned two Oscar nominations and two nods at the Golden Globes as well, including a Best Actress nomination for McDonnell at both events.

Mostly set at Louisiana State Penitentiary, (with a few scenes shot in Baton Rouge and other parts of the state) “Dead Man Walking” is based on the true story of Sister Helen Prejean (Susan Sarandon), the spiritual adviser to death row inmate Matthew Poncelet (Sean Penn), an amalgamation of a pair of prisoners with whom the real Sister Helen worked. Tim Robbins, who helmed the film and adapted the screenplay, earned a Best Director nomination at the Oscars, Penn got a Best Actor nod and Sarandon won Best Actress.

Robert Duvall stars in “The Apostle” as a Texas preacher whose wife (Farrah Fawcett) begins an affair and attempts to oust him from his job, so he kills her new lover, flees the state, changes his name and starts a new church in Louisiana. “The Apostle” also stars John Beasley, Miranda Richardson, Billy Bob Thornton and June Carter Cash, but it was Duvall who earned a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

Critics hated “The Waterboy” about as much as the bayou-born Waterboy (Adam Sandler) hates Gatorade. But we don’t listen to critics. We listen to Mama, and Mama says critics are the devil. We also listen to audiences, who packed theaters like it was gameday, and sacked critics’ low expectations to the tune of $190 million. The 1998 screwball comedy set on the campus of the University of Louisiana featured the hilarious writing team of Sandler and Tim Herlihy. It included most of Sandler’s usual-suspect actors (plus Kathy Bates and Henry Winkler) and, in retrospect, it is among the comedian’s funnier films.

The late Michael Clarke Duncan turned out the performance of his career in the 1999 fantasy drama “The Green Mile,” based on the 1996 Stephen King novel of the same name and also starring Tom Hanks, Sam Rockwell, James Cromwell and David Morse. Although the film is set at the fictional Cold Mountain Penitentiary in Louisiana, “The Green Mile” was actually shot in Tennessee and North Carolina. 

There aren’t too many solid 21st century slasher film franchises, but “Hatchet” is a big exception. Set in the swamps of Louisiana, “Hatchet” centers on the evil, deformed and monstrous Victor Crowley, who preys on tourists and locals alike. Packed with plenty of scares and an over-the-top amount of blood, “Hatchet” quickly slashed its way into the hearts of horror fans and yielded three worthy sequels: “Hatchet II” (2010), “Hatchet III” (2013) and “Victor Crowley” (2017).

It may sound like a remake, reboot or sequel to the gritty 1992 crime drama “Bad Lieutenant” starring Harvey Keitel, but “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” is a standalone film from director Werner Herzog. Still, its protagonist is a police officer who uses drugs, gambles, and has illicit encounters with women all while on the job — except instead of Keitel, the lieutenant is perfectly played by Nicolas Cage. Although it was criminally underseen in theaters, “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” nevertheless received critical acclaim. 

For the kids in your life (or the kid in your heart), we wanted to include an animated film, and of course we went with the 2009 Disney movie “The Princess and the Frog.” Loosely based on “The Frog Prince,” the film is notable for featuring Tiana (Anika Noni Rose), who is the ninth Disney princess and the first black one in the studio’s history. Tiana begins the film as a hardworking waitress in New Orleans but eventually meets and falls for Naveen, a 20-year-old playboy prince from the fictional country of Maldonia.

A father (Dwight Henry) and his 6-year-old daughter (Quvenzhané Wallis) ride out a hurricane in a poor island community (inspired by the Isle de Jean Charles and shot on location around Montegut) in the Louisiana bayou in the 2012 Benh Zeitlin film “Beasts of the Southern Wild.” Zeitlin’s feature-length debut cleaned up on the film festival and awards show circuits, winning four honors at Cannes and two at Sundance, in addition to four Academy Award nominations.

The 2013 Solomon Northup biopic “12 Years a Slave” starts and ends in Saratoga, New York, but the 12 years in between are set (and shot) on a trio of plantations in Southern Louisiana. Northup is played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, who stars alongside Lupita Nyong'o, Michael Fassbender, Sarah Paulson, Paul Dano, Benedict Cumberbatch and Brad Pitt. “12 Years a Slave” was the feature film debut of Nyong’o, who won a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award in addition to the movie winning Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay.

For a list honoring Mardi Gras, we should probably end with a party movie like the 2017 comedy “Girls Trip.” Written by Kenya Barris and Tracy Oliver, the film features a cast of Regina Hall, Queen Latifah, Jada Pinkett Smith and Tiffany Hadish as the so-called “Flossy Posse,” a group of longtime friends who take a trip down to New Orleans for a music festival. Consistently hilarious, “Girls Trip” laughed all the way to the bank and a $141 million payday.