"Blood on the Bayou" big hit at Abbeville theater

‘“Blood on the Bayou” will not win any Academy Awards or any other movie award, but the more than 300 people who went to see the Abbeville-filmed movie did not care. This time the plot, special effects or acting did not have to be award winning to be enjoyable.

On Wednesday, residents from Vermilion Parish filled one and a half theaters to see the debut of the independent film and that starred 1978 Abbeville High graduate Russell Hebert.

The film, which took 18 months to complete and was 1 hour and 40 minutes long, was filmed 95 percent in Vermilion Parish. Two scenes were filmed in Lafayette. The rest of the movie was filmed throughout the parish, with Abbeville getting most of the scenes.

When the movie was over, everyone applauded.

“I liked it. It was a cute movie,” said one movie goer.

The movie has everything in it including comedy, blood, gun fire, fishing, dancing, and sex.

After the movie, Hebert, who also filmed and directed the movie, felt relieved.

“It was kind of odd watching the movie with a crowd of people,” said Hebert. “I pleasantly surprised to see so many people in the theater.”

Hebert, who pursued comedy for 10 years after graduating high school, said people laughed when he hoped they would. He also said he tried to push the envelope by throwing in nudity .

Hebert filmed, wrote, directed and starred in the movie. He plays a struggling detective in Abbeville (he kept Abbeville as the place everything took place). A female from New Orleans hires him to find her sister who went missing for four days. The girl was played by April Covert of Lafayette. He learns the missing girl is a dancer at the “Pink Chicken” Dance Club, so his visits the strip club in search of her.

He eventually finds her dead in an Abbeville hotel. Abbeville detective Jason Hebert plays a detective in the movie. Also, a candidate for Louisiana governor is assassinated in Abbeville. Joe Horn, who was in Abbeville for the movie showing, played the gubernatorial candidate who was shot and killed on the steps of the gazebo in Magdalen Square.

Wednesday night was the first time Horn was able to see the completed film.

“It was exciting,” said Horn in between signing autographs. “I’m honored to be in the film.”

Horn said acting is a career he would like to pursue now that he is finished with football.

After Horn is killed, Travis Richard, (the small town detective played by Hebert) spends the rest of the movie connecting the girl’s murder in the hotel with Horn’s assassination. Eventually, Travis Richard pieces that Horn’s campaign manager, played by Abbeville’s own David Bertrand, hired a person to kill Horn. Helping protect the pretty girl (Colvert) is long-time high school friend Darryl Rabassa, who plays a painter in the movie. Rabassa, the pretty girl and Hebert hide out in a tent in Tiger Lagoon for a couple of days. Eventually, Hebert is the hero in the movie because the detective solves the assassination and links it to the murder in the hotel.

Rabassa, who is a house painter when he is not acting, said he enjoyed making the movie.

“I loved it,” said Rabassa, whose character was killed by the assassin “Russell made it easy to act. Many times he customized the roles to fit the character.”

Now that it played in Abbeville, Hebert plans to market his independent movie to theaters in Lafayette and eventually to the film festivals throughout the United States.

“This is just the beginning,” Hebert said.