So good..... Jones and Goodman are amazing.... the only downside is sarsgard and Macdonald.... the movie would've been just as great without their flighty characters...

As an avid fan of the Dave Robicheaux novels, I consider "In the Electric Mist..." one of the weakest because it so busy with subplots and less-than-credible ghost sequences. Nevertheless, with a first rate director like Tavernier and a world class cast including Jones, Steenburgen and Goodman, I certainly expected greatness. But either the script writer totally failed at the critical task of sculpting out the excess and focusing the story lines into clear trajectories, or else the editor was pressured to deliver a 1 hour 40 minute film out of 3 hours of material. Whichever it was, the result is an engrossing mess. The performances, cinematography, and Cajun-noir atmosphere are intoxicating. But heaven forbid you try to understand the many story lines without having read the book. With so much plot crammed into a relatively short film, we are stuck with truncated scenes and an oddly staccato rhythm that makes for unsatisfying storytelling.I'm glad I watched it. The next Robicheaux book I read will be richer for the images of the bayou country and Jones's embodiment of Dave's complex, flawed character. But I'm frustrated by the thought of the film it could have been.

Yeah, OK, I get the lowish rating.Like they used to say in the 1920s, everyone's a critic.Truer than ever I suppose, with the IMDb.But the strange thing is that I have now seen this movie beginning to end about a half-dozen times and I don't tire of it.That's unusual.Especially with some 600 IMDb reviews under my belt, even I get curious when it is so easy to get lost, to lose time, in what seems at first glance to be just another police procedural with multiple instances of the word "chere" in the script...? Then I look closer and go aha! Jones and Goodman. Jones and Goodman. Jones and Goodman.Two of the best that Hollywood ever produced, each an extraordinarily well-rounded actor, yet each with a special gift at portraying one specific type of character.Jones portraying a cop with no off button, who only knows that every crime must be solved.And Goodman playing a larger than life character who only knows that every event in his life must end with him on top, no matter who has to die in the process. Literally.They take a mundane procedural to the level of art.Mary Steenburgen helps. The whole supporting cast is fine.But Jones and Goodman are doing their best work here, leaving a legacy for actors of the future to study.And no one noticed.Until just now.

Watched this on cable a couple times because it's set in the Louisiana bayous where my family on my father's side comes from. We're from Bodcau Bayou in Springhill, LA. It was only okay.Then I watched the real movie, and it lived up to the potential I knew it had. Don't watch this on cable, cut by commercials and censors. Tommy Lee Jones, nominated three times for best actor in a supporting role, and having won once for "The Fugitive" in 1993, will immerse you in N'awleans Cajun culture. Personally, I can't believe he did not win more for "No Country for Old Men." Well, he won the National Board of Review USA, and the San Diego Film Critics Society, and the Screen Guild Actors Award, but no Oscar, even though he was nominated.This is a story that will keep you mesmerized if you watch it uncensored and uncut. If your only option is cable other than TCM or Sundance skip it and find a video, but it'd worth seeking out.If you find it uncut it will bring you into the bayou culture for a couple of hours and really make you care about what happens to these characters.Most of the cable channels slash it too much too even follow it. Enjoy!