In addition to the relatively small number of movies about blues that features blues musicians, there are non-blues films utilizing blues music or demonstrating a strong blues influence.  Perhaps the best example of this latter type is the 1996 film Ghost World.  While not directly about the blues, the storyline focuses on a blues 78-rpm record collector (played by Steve Buscemi) and the powerful emotional impact therecording "Devil Got My Woman" by Skip James has on the character Enid (played by Thora Birch).  A number of films utilize blues music in their soundtracks despite a lack of any musical focus to their plots.  Some examples include the civil rights film Ghosts of Mississippi (1997), which includes several examples of Delta and Chicago blues in the soundtrack and Big Bad Love (2001), containing extensive examples of north Mississippi hill country blues.  John Lee Hooker's music appears in at least seven films, while Hooker makes cameo performances in The Blues Brothers (1980) and Heaven's Prisoners (1996).

The storyline of the 1986 film Crossroads relies heavily upon the legend of blues musician Robert Johnson allegedly making a deal with the devil in exchange for his impressive musical talent.  In the movie, Eugene Martone (played by Ralph Macchio) is a young man studying classical guitar at Julliard who becomes obsessed with learning the blues.  Martone visits a local blues musician named Willie Brown (played by Joe Seneca), who promises to teach Eugene a hidden Robert Johnson tune if Martone can help Willie escape his nursing home and get back home to Mississippi.  [go to page 3 >>]