i read the book trying to get an understanding of values that are unfamiliar to me. I can imagine a movie undertaking the story that carries this, but I wonder if the philosophical underpinnings get lost.
The US is a large country with many different cultures, subcultures, and values. And unlike the stereotypes that the right/left coast metro media portrays; we Appalachia folks are not ignorant rednecks but rather decent, hardworking middle class people who help each other without being needed to be asked. Forty five years ago my first date with my wife was not a 6-pack and a drive to a highway overpass bridge in a pickup to show her that I spray painted her name on it!
I think that Ron Howard tried to remove some of the book’s political undercurrents but the movie has moments of distasteful classism. I grew up mostly in the northeast and moved to southern Appalachia as a young man and have had the opportunity to do significant amount of travel during my career. In my opinion no part of this country (or world) is immune from bias, prejudice, and stereotyping. I think that the division between us all is now as great as it has ever been. I liked the parts of the book/movie which humanized the characters but unfortunately I doubt that those who have preconceptions of ‘rednecks’ will reconsider their biases. We are all humans, we are all equal.
Don
Don't worry philb, it was like that in the suburbs as well.
As someone who read the book to understand things, i was looking to learn. In small part, that happened, but I still understand very little of important aspects of the people Vance brought with him in the book.
One day, I hope that changes. In the meantime, I keep trying.
I grew up in the south and I think they learnt me pretty good in skool.
The only hillbilly's I know of are the Beverly Hillbillies!
My father’s family emigrated in and lived in that part of the world during the 1760s - 1800s then moved west to Chicago.
A large number of Appalachian workers moved up to Flint and Detroit to work in the auto factories. A high percentage of my co-workers at GM were in this group and they were hard working, clever folks who made awesome tradesmen. Their independent spirit provided the backbone for the UAW labor movement.
When folks mention an Appalachian accent, they are actually talking about what much of Britain sounded like during the late 18th century. One of my linguistics professors at the University of Michigan, Dr. Barry, said that if you want to know what King George III sounded like when he spoke, go to remote areas of Appalachia. The mountains kept the folks there isolated so their dialect didn’t shift and evolve like the more coastal regions. Cool beans, eh?
I grew up in Tennessee, lived in New York, have lived in northeast Florida for years,have travelled all across this country and just got back again from California. Southern people are the most maligned, ridiculed, misunderstood and feared people in this country. Change my mind.
I have not seen Hillbilly Elegy yet. I did notice last night that it is available on Netflix. I did however read a very lengthy review of the movie. I cant remember exactly from where; I think it might have been from either the NY Times or the Washington Post. The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career.
The reviewer said that the movie was a blatant and cheap attempt at Oscar relevance and that it followed a very well worn playbook i.e. "let's exploit every Southern stereotype in the book".
I may get around to watching it but I'm sure I've already seen many just like it.
ernieinjax: KUDOS!!!
Not having seen the film or any new film for years (at least the past twenty) is it one of those that was filmed in a coal cellar with the lights out?
What happened to the film studios that used to provide glorious daylight films, Oklahoma, Sound of Music, Lawrence of Arabia, Gigi, My Fair Lady etc.
Presume it is now done in an aircraft Hanger because it's cheaper and less visual or noise interference.
Even tv series seem very dark and dismal now, perhaps it's my old eyes or maybe just my age.
"The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career. "
During WW2 an American GI from Appalachian region married a distant female relative of mine. Our family lived in the East London dock area in a town called Silvertown. Silvertown was a man made island with heavy industry along the River Thames and the Royal group of docks on the other side and terrace houses in between. It was regarded as a pretty rough place, although as a kid it didn't seem that way. The policemen always walked their beat in pairs. Anyway the GI was worried that his wife would feel he was taking her down a level to live in his town. She must of liked it as years later an uncle visited and reported she was very happy with her new home. My late grandmother, a real family matriarch who lived into her nineties, always said she had gone live with the "hilly billys". Mind you she could never get the country I live right. Thailand became Taiwan or even Malaya for the old lady.
"Never take another persons word see for yourself and then decide"
Just look at JK Rowling she was turned down on numerous occasions by publishers who "Didn't like" her Harry Potter book!!
"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out," explained Decco Recording Co. in 1962. They rejected signing a little-known group called the Beatles.
Don
Worried a bit about of topic - feel free to delete. My husband worked for the SBA Disaster Assistance Agency and probably spent 2 or 3 years total in West Virginia / Kentucky Appalachia. Don's observations on the people are spot on ("decent, hardworking middle class people who help each other without being needed to be asked.) Much of his time was spent in McDowell County (arguably the richest county in the nation during WWI and WWII when demand peaked for hard coal, now one of the poorest)and Logan County (Hatfield-McCoy country).
They(SBA) had a temporary office set up under Silver Bridge (Mothman Prophecies)for a week. He said he got the same feeling of lost souls he had later at Ground Zero shortly after 9/11.
He came across this on the internet and felt it perhaps helps to explain in some small way why the whole area is so special - it was written by a local (WV) band.
Silver Bridge, Point Pleasant, WV 1967
Any time you've got people one generation away from outdoor plumbing and
growing their own food watching MTV and fooling with the internet, it's
going to be a strange mixture.
That's West Virginia. A borderland of sorts where the 19th century
meets the 21st. Where everyone in the state seems to know everyone else
in an uncanny sort of way. Where old men with fiddles sing songs
familiar to people who lived in the 1700's and young kids with guitars
attempt sonic self-immolation to express the modern world angst. Where
there's no opportunity and despair is as close as your front door; where
the land holds an almost pagan sway over the minds and hearts of those
born here. Where people are slaves on their own land due to absentee
landlords, yet walk the mountains with the pride of Kings. Farmhouses
whose planks still have Civil War bullets embedded in them and a marble
mythological vision of a Capitol building that has no peer in the U.S.
From Wheeling to Wyoming County, Harper's Ferry to Helvetia, the Ohio
River to Big Ugly Creek, the Sinks of Gandy to Seneca.
So we become accustom to ghosts. They swirl all around us past, present
and future. We don't forget our dead, revel in living, wonder about our
future. So when the fabric of realty stretches to the breaking point
and beyond, the descendants of pioneers don't panic; they accept and go
on.
Point Pleasant WV. The site of an epic Indian/European battle in 1775.
Before there even was a West Virginia, or a United States of America.
So there are ghosts. A town grew up. The river rose, the river fell;
life's rhythms went on. In the mid-sixties, UFO's, creatures from
beyond, mass hysteria, a curse, black magic, a moth-like figure, who
knows?
People got up every morning and went to work, no matter how strange it
got, the mortgage had to be paid, the children had to eat. And then the
bridge went down.
Nobody's forgotten. They never will.
Silver Bridge. A tragedy. A symbol. A band. Trying to make sense of
it all. Welcome to the borderland. Don't look back. You've burnt your
bridges. Even a bridge of Silver burns when it get hot enough.
Silver Bridge....
Rusty Marks - Guitars, Banjo & Vocals
Todd Gambill - Guitars & Vocals
Bill Robinson - Mandolin, Electric & Upright Bass
Mark Lanham - Percussion
Kelly Bragg -Vocals, Violin
"The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career."
"there ain't nuthin' for y'all to see here folks. "
"I wouldn't watch this movie again - even if my best friend offered to buy the beer and pizza."
thanks for the review, Dave
you're too much like me for me not to know that bypassing free pizza and beer just to avoid a movie is stenchville.
Alright, PM me your second worst movie
Hey David, not sure if you meant 1) a second movie that I would rate so low; or b) my second-worst rating category. So...
If 1) I can't think of another movie I've seen recently that I would give that rating to.
If 2) That is my second-worst rating for a movie. My lowest rating is
"I would buy the beer and pizza for my best friend to find another buddy to watch the movie with, if he promised to leave me out of it."
The film Hillbilly Elegy is playing at the local cinemax and also on Netflix. Guess where i watched it ? I didn't know if it was going to be some sort of joke or what...but it was a touching story..well worth watching (my opinion).
re: Hillbilly Elegy
i read the book trying to get an understanding of values that are unfamiliar to me. I can imagine a movie undertaking the story that carries this, but I wonder if the philosophical underpinnings get lost.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
The US is a large country with many different cultures, subcultures, and values. And unlike the stereotypes that the right/left coast metro media portrays; we Appalachia folks are not ignorant rednecks but rather decent, hardworking middle class people who help each other without being needed to be asked. Forty five years ago my first date with my wife was not a 6-pack and a drive to a highway overpass bridge in a pickup to show her that I spray painted her name on it!
I think that Ron Howard tried to remove some of the book’s political undercurrents but the movie has moments of distasteful classism. I grew up mostly in the northeast and moved to southern Appalachia as a young man and have had the opportunity to do significant amount of travel during my career. In my opinion no part of this country (or world) is immune from bias, prejudice, and stereotyping. I think that the division between us all is now as great as it has ever been. I liked the parts of the book/movie which humanized the characters but unfortunately I doubt that those who have preconceptions of ‘rednecks’ will reconsider their biases. We are all humans, we are all equal.
Don
re: Hillbilly Elegy
Don't worry philb, it was like that in the suburbs as well.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
As someone who read the book to understand things, i was looking to learn. In small part, that happened, but I still understand very little of important aspects of the people Vance brought with him in the book.
One day, I hope that changes. In the meantime, I keep trying.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
I grew up in the south and I think they learnt me pretty good in skool.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
The only hillbilly's I know of are the Beverly Hillbillies!
re: Hillbilly Elegy
My father’s family emigrated in and lived in that part of the world during the 1760s - 1800s then moved west to Chicago.
A large number of Appalachian workers moved up to Flint and Detroit to work in the auto factories. A high percentage of my co-workers at GM were in this group and they were hard working, clever folks who made awesome tradesmen. Their independent spirit provided the backbone for the UAW labor movement.
When folks mention an Appalachian accent, they are actually talking about what much of Britain sounded like during the late 18th century. One of my linguistics professors at the University of Michigan, Dr. Barry, said that if you want to know what King George III sounded like when he spoke, go to remote areas of Appalachia. The mountains kept the folks there isolated so their dialect didn’t shift and evolve like the more coastal regions. Cool beans, eh?
re: Hillbilly Elegy
I grew up in Tennessee, lived in New York, have lived in northeast Florida for years,have travelled all across this country and just got back again from California. Southern people are the most maligned, ridiculed, misunderstood and feared people in this country. Change my mind.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
I have not seen Hillbilly Elegy yet. I did notice last night that it is available on Netflix. I did however read a very lengthy review of the movie. I cant remember exactly from where; I think it might have been from either the NY Times or the Washington Post. The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career.
The reviewer said that the movie was a blatant and cheap attempt at Oscar relevance and that it followed a very well worn playbook i.e. "let's exploit every Southern stereotype in the book".
I may get around to watching it but I'm sure I've already seen many just like it.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
ernieinjax: KUDOS!!!
re: Hillbilly Elegy
Not having seen the film or any new film for years (at least the past twenty) is it one of those that was filmed in a coal cellar with the lights out?
What happened to the film studios that used to provide glorious daylight films, Oklahoma, Sound of Music, Lawrence of Arabia, Gigi, My Fair Lady etc.
Presume it is now done in an aircraft Hanger because it's cheaper and less visual or noise interference.
Even tv series seem very dark and dismal now, perhaps it's my old eyes or maybe just my age.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
"The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career. "
re: Hillbilly Elegy
During WW2 an American GI from Appalachian region married a distant female relative of mine. Our family lived in the East London dock area in a town called Silvertown. Silvertown was a man made island with heavy industry along the River Thames and the Royal group of docks on the other side and terrace houses in between. It was regarded as a pretty rough place, although as a kid it didn't seem that way. The policemen always walked their beat in pairs. Anyway the GI was worried that his wife would feel he was taking her down a level to live in his town. She must of liked it as years later an uncle visited and reported she was very happy with her new home. My late grandmother, a real family matriarch who lived into her nineties, always said she had gone live with the "hilly billys". Mind you she could never get the country I live right. Thailand became Taiwan or even Malaya for the old lady.
re: Hillbilly Elegy
"Never take another persons word see for yourself and then decide"
re: Hillbilly Elegy
"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out," explained Decco Recording Co. in 1962. They rejected signing a little-known group called the Beatles.
Don
re: Hillbilly Elegy
Worried a bit about of topic - feel free to delete. My husband worked for the SBA Disaster Assistance Agency and probably spent 2 or 3 years total in West Virginia / Kentucky Appalachia. Don's observations on the people are spot on ("decent, hardworking middle class people who help each other without being needed to be asked.) Much of his time was spent in McDowell County (arguably the richest county in the nation during WWI and WWII when demand peaked for hard coal, now one of the poorest)and Logan County (Hatfield-McCoy country).
They(SBA) had a temporary office set up under Silver Bridge (Mothman Prophecies)for a week. He said he got the same feeling of lost souls he had later at Ground Zero shortly after 9/11.
He came across this on the internet and felt it perhaps helps to explain in some small way why the whole area is so special - it was written by a local (WV) band.
Silver Bridge, Point Pleasant, WV 1967
Any time you've got people one generation away from outdoor plumbing and
growing their own food watching MTV and fooling with the internet, it's
going to be a strange mixture.
That's West Virginia. A borderland of sorts where the 19th century
meets the 21st. Where everyone in the state seems to know everyone else
in an uncanny sort of way. Where old men with fiddles sing songs
familiar to people who lived in the 1700's and young kids with guitars
attempt sonic self-immolation to express the modern world angst. Where
there's no opportunity and despair is as close as your front door; where
the land holds an almost pagan sway over the minds and hearts of those
born here. Where people are slaves on their own land due to absentee
landlords, yet walk the mountains with the pride of Kings. Farmhouses
whose planks still have Civil War bullets embedded in them and a marble
mythological vision of a Capitol building that has no peer in the U.S.
From Wheeling to Wyoming County, Harper's Ferry to Helvetia, the Ohio
River to Big Ugly Creek, the Sinks of Gandy to Seneca.
So we become accustom to ghosts. They swirl all around us past, present
and future. We don't forget our dead, revel in living, wonder about our
future. So when the fabric of realty stretches to the breaking point
and beyond, the descendants of pioneers don't panic; they accept and go
on.
Point Pleasant WV. The site of an epic Indian/European battle in 1775.
Before there even was a West Virginia, or a United States of America.
So there are ghosts. A town grew up. The river rose, the river fell;
life's rhythms went on. In the mid-sixties, UFO's, creatures from
beyond, mass hysteria, a curse, black magic, a moth-like figure, who
knows?
People got up every morning and went to work, no matter how strange it
got, the mortgage had to be paid, the children had to eat. And then the
bridge went down.
Nobody's forgotten. They never will.
Silver Bridge. A tragedy. A symbol. A band. Trying to make sense of
it all. Welcome to the borderland. Don't look back. You've burnt your
bridges. Even a bridge of Silver burns when it get hot enough.
Silver Bridge....
Rusty Marks - Guitars, Banjo & Vocals
Todd Gambill - Guitars & Vocals
Bill Robinson - Mandolin, Electric & Upright Bass
Mark Lanham - Percussion
Kelly Bragg -Vocals, Violin
re: Hillbilly Elegy
"The review said it was an absolutely terrible movie, the worst of Ron Howard's career."
"there ain't nuthin' for y'all to see here folks. "
"I wouldn't watch this movie again - even if my best friend offered to buy the beer and pizza."
re: Hillbilly Elegy
thanks for the review, Dave
you're too much like me for me not to know that bypassing free pizza and beer just to avoid a movie is stenchville.
Alright, PM me your second worst movie
re: Hillbilly Elegy
Hey David, not sure if you meant 1) a second movie that I would rate so low; or b) my second-worst rating category. So...
If 1) I can't think of another movie I've seen recently that I would give that rating to.
If 2) That is my second-worst rating for a movie. My lowest rating is
"I would buy the beer and pizza for my best friend to find another buddy to watch the movie with, if he promised to leave me out of it."