TGTPTU’s good ol’ boys continue their binge with another director-hack four-pack, this time with that pilsner of directors, Richie Cunningham himself (Ron Howard) as we funnel a second watery intoxicant down our gullets and try not to puke with HILLBILLY ELEGY (2020).
Labeled a drama/comedy, this Netflix original is light on the latter, despite the normally exceptional screenwriter Vanessa Taylor being credited with the dramatization/adaptation of the 2016 autobiographical bestseller by the couch-copulating and at the time relatively unknown, already Peter Thiel-influenced, yet-to-be politician J. D. Vance. And also despite being lensed by pod-fav Maryse Alberti both initially and last discussed during Season 11’s The Wrestler when Aronofsky took a break from Libatique as cinematographer (S11, E2, Airdate 2/17/24).
Set primarily in two timelines (though no promises that a flashback did not have its own flashback or flashforward within), in one storyline the middle-school-aged J. D. spends most of his time in Ohio (FYI: Ohio is not part of Appalachia) with his manic mother before her mother (his grandmother) takes him as her charge and forces him to get some learning. The second timeline occurs over a few days as college-aged J. D. is a fish out of water at fancy, multi-fork dinner functions and must lean on his fiancée and an unlimited minutes cell phone plan to navigate the high society waters of Yale Law School (where she also attends). These two timelines thematically converge when J. D. must return to his Ohioan roots to confront his mother’s drug addiction, maxing out credit cards for gasoline and treatment, and teaching us a lesson that need-based college handouts and credit card debt are terrible things for other poor folks but if you’re the protagonist of a Ron Howard, triple Golden Raspberry nominated film, they’re what you need to be a best-selling writer and presidential lapdog.
THEME SONG BY: WEIRD A.I.
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Ken: Ken Koral
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