Hillbilly Elegy.
Directed by Ron Howard.
Starring Amy Adams, Glenn Close, Haley Bennett, Gabriel Basso, Bo Hopkins, Owen Asztalos and Freida Pinto. Streaming on Netflix from November 24th 116 mins.
Ron Howard's screen adaptation of J.D. Vance's best selling memoir is unlike most Hollywood based on true story projects in that you do believe that the story you're being shown is true – it's all dull enough to have actually happened.
It's not an uninteresting story. Raised in Ohio, Vance was born of Kentucky Appalachian stock to a single mother (Adams) but despite his humble and chaotic upbringing he managed to get into Yale to study law. In the film though this translates into a series of vignettes that might pass a few minutes as Doyouremeberthattimewhen reminiscences at a family gathering but aren't likely to grip the attention of a movie audience.
And, let's be honest, Out Of Adversity A Lawyer Was Born! isn't one of the great inspirational narratives.*
The screen version flicks back and forth between teenage Vance (Asztalos) and the grown-up version, (Basso.) Teen Vance and his sister (Bennett), try to hold it together as their volatile mother throws violent tantrums and flits between a variety of jobs, boyfriends and addictions. Looking out for them is granny Close – looking like a reptilian Mrs Merton – who is tough and foulmouthed but mostly loving. Framing this is Big Vance's story at Yale in the middle of a series of potentially career-defining job placement interviews having to drive back home because his mother has overdosed on heroin.
I went into this knowing nothing about J.D. and his book, which I took to be another misery memoir. Turns out it's a conservative political tract in which Vance argues that Appalachian and other rustbelt poor are kept down by their own culture and values. That sounds to me like another self-made man kicking the ladder away after he's climbed up it spiel but when the book came out during the 2016 election campaign Vance was seen as an anti-Trump Republican that liberals could get on with – proved by his book now being a Ron Howard film.
But absolutely none of that it is in the film. If anything the film flips the message. The book argues that poor working-class people need to break the loyalties and dependencies that have held them back, the legacy of violence and verbal abuse passed down the generation. Watching the film I found it hard to have any empathy with the characters because they, and the mother in particular, seemed to be hooked on chaos and drama; they're like clowns who are constantly throwing banana skins out in front of themselves. Which I guess is similar to the message of Vance's book but it isn't that of the film, which feeds off this self destructive behaviour for its drama and as a message offers the standard slop about family mattering more than anything, a credo that excuses and perpetuates all misery.
(Actually, after all that, Vance didn't become a lawyer. No he became a Venture Capitalist. Hurray.)
Directed by Ron Howard.
Starring Amy Adams, Glenn Close, Haley Bennett, Gabriel Basso, Bo Hopkins, Owen Asztalos and Freida Pinto. Streaming on Netflix from November 24th 116 mins.
Ron Howard's screen adaptation of J.D. Vance's best selling memoir is unlike most Hollywood based on true story projects in that you do believe that the story you're being shown is true – it's all dull enough to have actually happened.
It's not an uninteresting story. Raised in Ohio, Vance was born of Kentucky Appalachian stock to a single mother (Adams) but despite his humble and chaotic upbringing he managed to get into Yale to study law. In the film though this translates into a series of vignettes that might pass a few minutes as Doyouremeberthattimewhen reminiscences at a family gathering but aren't likely to grip the attention of a movie audience.
And, let's be honest, Out Of Adversity A Lawyer Was Born! isn't one of the great inspirational narratives.*
The screen version flicks back and forth between teenage Vance (Asztalos) and the grown-up version, (Basso.) Teen Vance and his sister (Bennett), try to hold it together as their volatile mother throws violent tantrums and flits between a variety of jobs, boyfriends and addictions. Looking out for them is granny Close – looking like a reptilian Mrs Merton – who is tough and foulmouthed but mostly loving. Framing this is Big Vance's story at Yale in the middle of a series of potentially career-defining job placement interviews having to drive back home because his mother has overdosed on heroin.
I went into this knowing nothing about J.D. and his book, which I took to be another misery memoir. Turns out it's a conservative political tract in which Vance argues that Appalachian and other rustbelt poor are kept down by their own culture and values. That sounds to me like another self-made man kicking the ladder away after he's climbed up it spiel but when the book came out during the 2016 election campaign Vance was seen as an anti-Trump Republican that liberals could get on with – proved by his book now being a Ron Howard film.
But absolutely none of that it is in the film. If anything the film flips the message. The book argues that poor working-class people need to break the loyalties and dependencies that have held them back, the legacy of violence and verbal abuse passed down the generation. Watching the film I found it hard to have any empathy with the characters because they, and the mother in particular, seemed to be hooked on chaos and drama; they're like clowns who are constantly throwing banana skins out in front of themselves. Which I guess is similar to the message of Vance's book but it isn't that of the film, which feeds off this self destructive behaviour for its drama and as a message offers the standard slop about family mattering more than anything, a credo that excuses and perpetuates all misery.
(Actually, after all that, Vance didn't become a lawyer. No he became a Venture Capitalist. Hurray.)
