Eve's Bayou (1997)

Debbi Morgan: Mozelle Batiste Delacroix

Photos 

Quotes 

• Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : Life is filled with goodbyes, Eve, a million goodbyes, and it hurts every time. Sometimes, I feel like I've lost so much, I have to find new things to lose. All I know is, there must be a divine point to it all, and it's just over my head. That when we die, it will all come clear. And then we'll say, "So that was the damn point." And sometimes, I think there's no point at all, and maybe that's the point. All I know is most people's lives are a great disappointment to them and no one leaves this earth without feeling terrible pain. And if there is no divine explanation at the end of it all, well... that's sad.

• Roz Batiste : When I first met Louis, I saw him set the leg of a boy who had fallen out of a tree. And I thought to myself, "Here is a man who can fix things. He's a healer, he'll take care of me." So I leave my family, and I move to this swamp, and I find out he's just a man.

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : We're two of a kind, my brother and I. One day, he'll open his eyes and see that what he's been looking for is right in front of him. Then he'll stop looking for what he already has.

  Roz Batiste : But what if it's too late?

• Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : ... if you get careless again with your mama's feelings, I swear I'll do you harm. You understand me?

• Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : You can't possibly marry me. I can't let that happen.

  Julian Grayraven : Is it that you don't love me?

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : No! No, it's not that, it's... Bare with me. I'm cursed. I can't have children. I'm barren.

  Julian Grayraven : You're not barren. You're wounded. Here.

  [putting his hand on her heart] 

  Julian Grayraven : And it's here that I'll plant seeds.

• Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : [looking in mirror, where she sees a reflection of her three dead husbands]  I loved him, I swear I did.

  Eve : I know. It's not your fault they die.

• Elzora : Some things are better left unsaid.

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : I paid you a dollar, old woman. Now tell my fortune.

  Elzora : I don't need no cat bones to tell your fortune, Mozelle Batiste. You are a curse. The Black Widow. Next man that marries you is a dead man. Like the others. Always be that way.

• Eve Batiste : How do you kill someone with voodoo?

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : Hmm, I almost forgot you was there. Stick some pins in a doll, perhaps. I really don't know. What made you ask that?

  Eve Batiste : Nothing.

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : Well, you must have been thinking something before you said it. What led you to that particular thought?

  [Glances at Eve] 

  Eve Batiste : I don't know...

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : [Expression becomes serious]  Is there some you're angry with? Someone you want dead?

  Eve Batiste : [pauses]  I'm going inside.

  [Turns to leave] 

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : [Stops Eve]  No, I think you better tell me what's on your mind!

• Eve Batiste : [while dusting off the pictures of Mozelle's late husbands]  Which one did you love best?

  Mozelle Batiste Delacroix : I don't know, Eve. They was all different. Anderson was the handsomest man I had ever seen. Your Uncle Harry, he was the sweetest. And Maynard....Maynard loved me most of all. You know, when I was your age, before I ever did the counseling, I could look at people, complete strangers, and see their whole lives so clear. But when I looked at each of my husbands, I never saw a thing. That's how it always is. Blind to my own life.