Hillbilly Elegy (2020) Movie Review

Hillbilly Elegy is the latest feature film from director Ron Howard. It’s based on the book of the same name by J.D. Vance which chronicles the story of Vance’s life. In case you’re like me and haven’t read the book, I’ll hit the high points of the plot. The movie oscillates between young J.D. (Owen Asztalos) and older J.D. (Gabriel Basso). Young J.D. has to suffer the pains of growing up with a drug addicted mother, Bev (Amy Adams). His grandma, who everyone refers to as Mamaw (Glenn Close), and a smattering of uncles practice and preach the idea that family is everything. Even if that family is a giant mess who does nothing but cause you pain. That theme permeates throughout the entire film. You don’t turn your back on family. That fact is important because you will wonder why J.D. ever goes back and visits anyone in his family as you watch the movie unfold.

Bev is by all definitions a terrible mother. She is a drug addict who beats J.D. and is constantly losing her job and jumping from boyfriend to boyfriend. She carts J.D. and his sister Lindsay (Haley Bennett) from house to house as she hops from one boyfriend to the next, eventually marrying one at the drop of a hat. There isn’t anything redeeming about Bev although they attempt to make her sympathetic by saying she also had a rough childhood. Amy Adams is phenomenal but they make her fairly one dimensional, which is a shame because she’s capable of providing so much more.

Mamaw is a bit more complex, as she gives off a tough as nails vibe. She winds up taking J.D. from Bev’s house and showing him some tough love. She encourages him but also expects him to turn his own life around. Glenn Close is as always, marvelous, and she has the most growth and character arc of any of the characters. While watching the horrors J.D. had to endure as a child, you wonder how he or his sister Lindsay are functioning as adults at all. After Memaw turns him around, J.D. goes on to become a student at Yale Law School. But his old life comes knocking on his door at inopportune moments. He has to ultimately choose between bettering his own life or staying chained to his family. At one point in the movie Lindsay (who by the way is the wisest person in the whole movie) tells him, “Don’t make us your excuse for why you can’t do it.”

I’ll be honest, not a lot happens in Hillbilly Elegy. You are basically watching a series of bad things happen to a young boy who is trying to make sense of life. He is able to rise above it and some would call it the “American Dream” in action. It felt a little bit more like poverty porn to me. We watch as J.D. is beaten up by his mom, his grandma can’t afford to feed him, and he’s forced to make hard choices about his life at an age when he should be playing tag with his friends in the neighborhood. The point of the movie seems to be to showcase how awful J.D.’s life was as he grew up but despite this he persevered.

The movie didn’t do a whole lot for me other than recognizing that Adams and Close are wonderful actors despite being given very little material to work with. I wouldn’t be entirely shocked to see them get some nominations come awards season. However, Hillbilly Elegy didn’t have the effect that Ron Howard undoubtedly hoped it would. There’s a lot of yelling and hitting and drugs and generally bad situations on a continuous loop. It strives to tell a compelling story but really it just feels exploitative.

I haven’t read the book, but have heard from reliable sources that it contains a little more substance. I wish the movie had followed suit. It would have been nice to see Howard make some kind of commentary on systemic issues that so obviously plague this family. Instead, he sidesteps any kind of deep dive into what it actually looks like to grow up in Appalachia and resorts to overblown emotional scenes designed to force you to feel something for the main characters. The disconnect here is paramount and Howard completely misses the point with this adaptation of Hillbilly Elegy. 

Film or Movie: Movie
You’ll like this movie if:
1. You read Hillbilly Elegy
2. You believe in the “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” mantra
3. You just really love Amy Adams and Glenn Close