Nearly one in 10 Americans are out of work, about a million homes are foreclosed on each year and the dollar is at historic lows, but you'd never know it from watching American films. In Hollywood, whatever the topic -NYC rom-com, lesbian parents, ape uprisings, viral outbreak — the American Dream is alive and well. It's a matter of course that we find people ensconced in comfortable suburban homes or roomy urban lofts with a good car or two and lots of brand clothing, electronics and lattes.
While the British are quite good at pumping out films that reflect various levels of society — nice double-feature: "The Queen" followed by "Nil By Mouth" — it's the rare American film (and usually an indie) that peers into society's margins, where things are lean and getting leaner.
"Winter's Bone," the Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner from 2010, inhabits the same grungy, white-trash milieu glimpsed in such flicks as "River's Edge," "Boys Don't Cry" and "Spun." In particular, the film focuses on the Ozark Mountains of southern Missouri, a hardscrabble hillbilly region that keeps to itself. These days, like much of the poverty-line heartland, the Ozarks are awash with tweakers cooking up crystal meth, the poor man's cocaine. (In 2010 alone, Missouri busted nearly 2,000 meth labs.)