Review: "Hillbilly Elegy" is the Worst Kind of Oscar Bait

Scene from Hillbilly Elegy

There's a certain sadness that comes with reporting the news that Hillbilly Elegy is a giant misfire, embodying the familiar lower-class struggles as mindless melodrama. Even in the hands of someone as capable as director Ron Howard, there's no understanding of what lies underneath the surface. In a time where Middle America has a crisis worth sharing, Howard has decided to stop at the problem, too scared to have compassion for his characters. The themes of socioeconomics, drug addiction, and the passive aggressiveness it produces are details that are worth sharing, but there's no bigger point here. The ending likes to think there is, but Howard fails to make it matter. It's doubtful that he's even met a hillbilly. If he did, he would've known that their story deserves something more than nonstop shouting matches. 

At the center of the story is J.D. Vance (Gabriel Basso), who has managed to become something his family never could. He went from the son of a drug-addicted mother Bev (Amy Adams) to a Yale student on the verge of landing a major job. It's a good enough of a hook, and J.D. narrates his story as he commutes the 10 hours home to Middletown, where his family survives. Following Bev's relapse with heroin, he returns home, thinking about his whole life. He begins to understand how he became the man he was. In flashbacks, he begins to see the days of his teenage years with Bev and Mamaw (Glenn Close), discovering how easy he didn't have it.

The thing is that this is enough to make for a compelling drama. The stereotypes around hillbilly culture have remained largely negative over the decades, accusing them of being poorly educated messes. The irresponsibility of Hillbilly Elegy comes in how it reinforces the stereotypes without giving any deeper understanding to why people are like this. The screenplay mistakes conflict as character development, where every decision is sporadic. We don't get to understand why these people are vulnerable or passive-aggressive nor how the cycle of abuse would ever seek resolution. Mamaw in particular is a confusing character with her Mad Libs-level cursing that is supposed to be seen as "tough love," but where exactly was the love in everything?

Ron Howard is the worst thing that could've happened to Hillbilly Elegy. Every other component has the potential to adapt to this material and still bring depth and meaning to this family's struggle. It may be that the director is more attuned to the pity of it all, where he encourages the audience to feel sadness when Bev yells with J.D. over a drug test for work. It could be that he reinforces the idea three scenes in a row that she works at a dialysis clinic and is going through a rough time without showing her competence. J.D. insists that Bev was the top nurse in her program, but all the audience gets to see is her roller skating while high on pills through an intensive care unit. There are moments that would work if the audience had any deeper relationship with these characters. Instead, it plays like bad melodrama.

This is unfortunate because the central J.D. story had the potential to say something more profound, to give hope to the public's understanding of his family. For people who live outside of these towns, there is only negative stereotypes to pull from, generalizations that get caught up in phrases like economic struggles and opioid epidemics. That is all the film gets us. There's no sense of love in this story that isn't masked with confrontation, and even then it's more expected than developed. Mamaw is lovable because we're told she is, espousing advice to be tough and focus despite having little personal gain in her life. None of these characters have much going for them outside of woe, and it's the problem with the story.

The question is why should we love the family in Hillbilly Elegy. Sure, J.D. is a positive character who grew into something more ideal, but his backstory lacks any tender moment with his mother. All there is is Easters that are ruined because J.D. clumsily fell into painted eggs. There are arguments that never get resolved. Mamaw's only defining characteristic is that she was in an abusive marriage. There was no escape, no outlet or hope that would suggest she personally wanted to grow or escape this misery. She supports J.D., which is fine, but it mostly comes from an egregious amount of poorly assembled profanity and Terminator 2 quotes. She is recognizable as having potentially more depth to her, but in Howard's hands, she is pretty useless.

That's the thing here. Everything it's saying has the potential to make for a more compelling character drama, where the audience gets to see the humanity of drug addicts and spousal abuse. Instead, they just are privvy to the acts themselves, as they had been for decades. It's what keeps the film's truly heartbreaking moments from ever landing. It's understandable that there's pain, but when the film ends every conversation with someone threatening to punch someone out, the impact begins to be lost. If there was a more compassionate, understanding Midwest director out there, like a Debra Granik or Jeremy Saulnier type, this could be amazing. The moments could be more earned and we'd understand that somewhere in the flaws of anger is real love. For Howard, it's best just to assume.

This is the worst kind of Oscar bait imaginable. Whereas most films lobbying for awards would have some cohesion between filmmaker and subject, it feels like this was more an assignment, done to appease some contract. Howard doesn't seem interested at all in this world. Given his track record of crowd-pleasers, it's insane how brutal he treats these characters. Because of that, the shining moments of acting don't get nearly as bright as they could. It's all dim, lacking the confidence to strive for something greater, to break stereotypes, and become something more triumphant. Sure, Hillbilly Elegy is a sad story with a lot of important subjects on its mind. The issue is that it never wants to discuss them in a productive way that could seek to change the assumptions society has carried forever. Howard blew his chance to amplify art's full potential, and it's the film's biggest, least forgivable sin.