I decided to rip the bandaid off and watch this, because I know it’s only a matter of time until I feel obligated to for Oscar prep, and better to make this quarantined winter more manageable by seeing it now. And the result? Well, it's about as ridiculously "dramatic" as you'd expect from the get-go, especially older J.D. Vance's "redneck"-defense at dinner, followed by trying to reason with his sister about why he can't come home, which is responded to with an invalidating.. "can you just come home?" (a question that had been asked already four times in a span of three minutes, but
now it's done with dramatic pause- ahhh, cue inner conflict). What tries to be (and in all likelihood was, in its source) a fair call for sensitivity toward marginalized resource-diseased impoverished whites, comes off as a case of the Poor Me's and antithetical narrative whereby we're set up to expect a defense of this population as complex and instead get the liberal self-fulfilling prophecy diagnosing their problematic DNA. The worst part is that Ron Howard isn't trying to be mean-spirited, yet can't help but travel down that trajectory. In his defense, it's a lot easier.
And now for the (well, my) million dollar question.. No, it’s not a good depiction of addiction (duh), but it
is an unfortunately on-point depiction of the sensationalized kaleidoscope as the only means through which America feels comfortable
approaching addiction, a delusional intimacy that’s really an act of spying on the population from afar [Ah, addiction- where liberals and conservatives can agree on the condescending and offensive “pull yourself up by your bootstraps (but do it out of my eyesight)” philosophy]. There’s no attempt to understand or empathize because those who can turn on and off this numero-uno quick-fix coping skill in alcohol and drug use can’t comprehend the idea of no filter-switch, and the lack of willingness to get outside one’s own experience leaves only room left for pejorative sympathy and gawking.
The movie made me sick, and also reflected my experiences with non-addicts to a T via Howard’s self-aggrandizing, pitying worldview. Nobody really wants to know the complexities of the Amy Adams of the world, they just want to pretend like they do, and pat themselves on the back for watching a movie like this that forces them to get a faux-surrogate experience for a couple hours. Well here is an artificial form to make that possible for Netflix audiences 'round the country! Sometimes it feels really good to perpetuate stigma, I guess, especially if the alternative is challenging those comfy medieval preconceptions of addiction as a moral disease (just like.. we progressives expect conservatives to pull up 'dem bootstraps and challenge their own conceptions on
our issues?). From what I’ve heard, the book gave progressives their demanded “explanation” for why poor white conservatives vote as they do- as if we can truly “understand” another’s life, just to feel better within the framework of their own terms of engagement, so maybe this is a good adaptation, if in the spirit of its recontextualization only.
After I wrote this blurb, I decided to read Ty Burr’s, of the Boston Globe, review- since I tend to respect his Ebert-like tendency to delve into social justice in cases like these. He aptly calls it “poverty porn” but especially the end of his review is, unsurprisingly, a better summation of my own perceptions, and a pleasant reminder that like-minded allies exist in some places:
Ty Burr wrote:Worse, by neutering the specifics of where these people live and come from, Howard’s “Hillbilly Elegy” renders the story meaningless. Accents aside, the film could be taking place anywhere poverty and opioid addiction plague this country, and if “Elegy” is reasonably honest about the latter, there are real, systemic reasons the cycle continues the way it does in Kentucky and Middletown, Ohio, as opposed to elsewhere. Bev isn’t “poor white trash” just because her and Mamaw’s “pride” gets in the way. And plenty of people who grow up poor in the South have learned which fork to use or know the name of more than one white wine, both of which flummox law student Vance in an early scene.
But that’s the way “Hillbilly Elegy” portrays these people and the way a lot of viewers feel comfortable seeing them: As indomitable victims of their own lousy choices. The movie’s a neoliberal’s fantasy and a sociopolitical tract defanged. It will probably get nominated for a lot of awards.
Sadly, this is the way too many progressives I know (and respect), in my field and in my personal life, treat the idea of addiction- and all the suffering people that come with it. This is
their movie.
