This isn’t a surprise or a shock: the Academy Awards continually support those movies, which the masses want, so that must be why they exist – to praise those movies that satisfied the majority.
The New York Times, and a few other critically and incisively minded newspapers complain, every couple of years, about the lack of smart, personal movies that challenge us, but those clash masses, “Winter’s Bone.”
Jennifer Lawrence (middle) with her movie siblings
Movie-lovers, who wait patiently for those sort of experiences, and largely ignore the common and insipid ones (which most viewers pay for) and which Hollywood in-turn provides, find the situation morose, even maddening.
Even though the United States’ 310-million population is just over 51 percent female, and women have major money power, there are very few films made for or about strong women. And fewer smart, engrossing stories about them.
“Winter’s Bone” is a superior film to “The King’s Speech,” which was splendid unto itself. Still this’s the story of a very young woman who’s pushed by circumstances to contend with something well beyond her years. And she does so, at her physical and mental peril with no social support system. That beats the story of a middle-aged, spoiled aristocrat, whose father mercilessly bullied him.
At least as expected “Winter’s Bone” was recognized by the Film Independent Spirit awards with best supporting awards for Dale Dickey and John Hawkes’ subtle, menacing portrayals. These came after Black Swan got the lavish that it needed.
“Winter’s Bone” demands more from the viewers, more of an investment than “The King’s Speech” does. It’s more complex and subtle, has a more profound and far less understood social context, and has voice that’s at least a little more personal.
Upon seeing this week’s headlines indicating that the Los Angeles and Toronto Film Critics Associations and the New York Film Critics Circle (NYFCC) had all lifted “The Social Network” as 2010′s best film, a question leaped to mind: what?! That?!
Yes. The masses typically highlight conventional, studio-produced films as “the best.” Those films also typically have brawny budgets lifting their wings.
Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg in David Fincher's "The Social Network"
A different question, one of money and exposure or hype pops to mind as much as the incredulousness. So which criteria did these groups use? How much of the choice came down to the intensity of the promotion? Was there some budget-based bias?
When a film critic hasn’t seen a film, and when he or she has scant if any interest, they’re a fool to write about it. Hoards are preoccupied by and have latched onto Facebook, fascinated with its lifestyle utility. People are hungry to see the backstory, particularly if that boasts dirt.
A vital question: why don’t the New York film critics, in that metropolis that hosts New York University’s film school (i.e., a storied training ground for indie film-makers: Martin Scorsese, Spike Lee, Oliver Stone, Jim Jarmusch, among other lesser icons), at least consider an independent movie, a phenomenal one? The NYFCC is the one organization that stands out from its East Coast and Canadian peers by declaring, on the history page of his website, in part, to “…have consistently recognized, championed and defended films that may otherwise have been slighted by audiences and the entertainment industry.” Neither the Toronto nor the Los Angeles groups’ websites distinguish themselves with that stance on behalf of film art.
But Metropolis’ film critics circle has stood up for a film that needs no one to stand for it.
Hmm. What should a viewer make of that when the circle lauds a movie that suffered from no want for publicity? That’s ironic. It’s incongruent. After you’ve lived long enough, you learn, accept or resign yourself to the fact that organizations don’t always walk their talk. But it would be nice.
Out of a few engrossing independent stories, at least one stands out: “Winter’s Bone.” This isn’t a story many people have yet seen: a young resilient, perseverant woman must engage an odyssey in order to keep her family together, even while some of that family clash with her.
This story made its Minnesota premier this summer, around early June. What an awesome treat. It’s a new, innovative story about a young woman whose strength is way beyond her years, beyond the call of family. Also, “Winter’s Bone” was made by a woman. As a feminist, the chronic, persistent want for strong, engrossing female characters is old and tired – just backwards.
People will say that independent movies are just less popular or less profitable than profit-oriented ones. Reportedly according to Motion Picture Association of America’s numbers from early 2005, “approximately 15% of US domestic box office money came from independent films.” 2010′s Academy Awards broadcast had an average of about 41.3 million viewers over its more than three-hour-long program.
With the U.S. population at 310 million that stacks up to about 13% of America that watched the Oscars. An equal percentage of film-lovers seem to attend commercial movies as attend independent ones. Even if twice as many movie lovers attend movie theaters as watch the Oscars, that still connotes that commercial movies aren’t bludgeoning independent movies by the numbers.
“Winter’s Bone” is the refreshing story of a tough 17-year-old broad in the Ozarks, Ree Dolly, played by Jennifer Lawrence. I could describe her in more polite or delicate language, but I doubt that she would. Her story amounts to an odyssey as she locks horns with her rural, often criminal neighbors and family. Her dad, Jessup, put their house up as collateral for his bond when he was put in jail on drug charges for making meth. With his court date imminent and himself missing, Ree, hearty and hardened beyond her years, is saddled with fixing this.
Ree runs
Her mom can’t; she’s ill, seems catatonic. Her brother and sister are too young. In pleading for her neighbors’ cooperation, even empathy, she says, “they’re too young to even feed themselves yet.” You might call this film is a petty detective story is worth your time is because of Ree’s fight against the dire consequences for the family. This young broad’s story exemplifies a relentless love and commitment to her family, her siblings.
“Winter’s Bone” had its premiere, at least its Minnesotan one, on June 2nd at the Walker Art Center, where director Debra Granik introduced it and answered questions afterward.
Ree has to track down and deliver her father, even if it’s just evidence of his death, in order to keep her home. She doesn’t want to step on anyone’s toes, but those are the least of her concerns. She must feel like Harry Truman, a 20-century Missourian. After President Roosevelt died he said, “I felt like the moon, the stars and all the planets had fallen on me.” So, she’s willing to be denied, lied to, yelled at, bullied, and gang-beaten. She won’t take “no.” As long as her brother, sister, and mother are at-risk.
Location and culture as character:
Neither Ree, nor her family of sometime foes, are the only memorable characters. South Missouri and its poor, and often criminal subculture, are characters as much as “Winter’s Bone’s” characters are. The traditions dictate how people live their lives and treat one another.
In the introductory scenes, Granik, uses the sparse, poor kitchen where Ree prepares the breakfast to illustrate their poverty. The local morning radio show plays in the background. It plainly announces the community’s goings-on. This illustrates the work-a-day attitude of the area where the criminals and innocents alike make their ways. Soon enough we see the trailers and the shanty-like structures that the residents claim.
Ree comforts her brother while she has so little to spare
This ambiance reminds me of rural Nebraska, where a 1990s independent film,”Boys Don’t Cry,” takes place. So few TV or film stories, or at least good ones, about poor, rural peoples’ lives have been done; it’s very hard to spotlight useful comparisons. That’s why this film is refreshing and thankfully it’s potent story and well-developed characters make it stand out.
During the Walker Art Center’s Q&A, Ms. Granik said that “there are enough ‘ands’” that none of the details or characters should come off as stereotypes or digs at Hillbilly’s. By “ands” she describes social and moral contradictions; those people who are both tender and brutal, or aloof or cooperative, depending on the circumstance, or just how far down the wrong road their passions or uninterest have careened.
“Winter’s Bone” is memorable, maybe indelible. But there’s a caveat: The most memorable scenes are also the hardest to take. This is a world where the women’s strength must never rival a man’s. Her neighbors and family would just as soon punish her, in a way straight out of a Yakuza movie, if she won’t take their gruff, plain-spoken, yet subtle hints to back off. This is a world where contemporary gender equality is a foreign concept.
Ms. Granik describes the story and source of “Winter’s Bone” on the Sundance Film Festival’s “Meet the Artist”
Early on, when she presses her uncle, Teardrop, to stop being cryptic, but be straight with her, he grabs her up by her throat, as he might to discipline a hound, to deliver his insistent point. Basically: “Shut up and suck it up!” He sets the community’s tone and attitude toward her straights. Finally after an elder’s convinced that she’s pushed too far, his wife – who had already abundantly established that neither of them is to be troubled – leads a small gang of women to beat Teardrop’s point home to her – barbarically. It’s bloody.
And Ree pushes on. Warily.
The film’s only flaw is a dream montage that stands out so much from the whole story’s style that it distracts you. It’s very brief. But I don’t know why it was there either.
It comes out in wide release on June 11 and an even wider on June 26, depending on where you are.
Why bother?
We have a strong, perseverant female lead character
It’s a refreshing, but simple, even innovative, detective story
The narrative and characters are thoroughly developed, as adapted from the novel
We are introduced to, or reminded of, a very different way of life, in South Missouri
