An insight into the weirdly co-dependent relationship between the reasonable, accommodating women and the terrifyingly irrational men of the Ozarks is provided by Marshall Sahlins’ seminal paper on Polynesia power dynamics “Poor Man, Rich Man, Big-Man, Chief — Political types in Melanesia and Polynesia” (1983). "[3] The film also has a score of 90 out of 100 on Metacritic based on reviews from 38 critics indicating "universal acclaim". We are ruled not by a Patriarchal father but by a Kyriarchal lord and the shape of that lord is forever changing. It’s beautifully shot, showcasing one of the faces … Written by Lisa R. Pruitt. [13] It also received two awards at the 2010 Berlin Film Festival in Germany and at the 2010 Stockholm International Film Festival, it won the awards for Best Film, Best Actress (Lawrence) and the Fipresci Prize. (1984), Andrei Rublev (1966) – Some We Call Nothing at All, Ivan’s Childhood (1962) – Adolescent Dreamscapes, Grey Gardens (1975) – Hell is a Collection of Dead Raccoons, Humanity’s Inhumanity to Humanity « Cathedral Crossings, The Kids Are All Right (2010) – It’s a Woman’s World… Thanks to Men. She makes sure her siblings eat and teaches them survival skills such as hunting and cooking. An unflinching Ozark Mountain girl hacks through dangerous social terrain as she hunts down her drug-dealing father while trying to keep her family intact. Ree tells him that Jessup must be dead, because "Dollys don't run". They are not to be trusted or reasoned with. Winter's Bone is a 2010 American mystery drama film directed by Debra Granik. The film stars Jennifer Lawrence as a teenage girl in the rural Ozarks of Missouri who, to protect her family from eviction, must locate her missing father. Winter’s Bone is based on the book by Daniel Woodrell, who says in John Williams’ Back to the Badlands, “These people are so alienated from American culture that it’s like a parallel universe.” Post was not sent - check your email addresses! You wouldn’t understand. Directed by Debra Granik. Unmistakably filmed on location, this film focuses on a society that has been left behind. If one is talking to Thump then it is already too late. Shelley Waggener as Sonya - a neighbour who takes care of Ree's horse. Indeed, while Winter’s Bone depicts the men of the Ozark mountains as violent, unpredictable and savage, it also makes it abundantly clear that these are social roles that the men are forced into. Imagine an ending where Ree does convince Teardrop to give up his noirish cycle-of-violence ways, where he just sits down on the porch and plays the banjo for them, and maybe sticks around for a plate of squirrel stew and helps with the … They are to be feared. He will not give his niece any information that might help her track down his brother. It is upon the naked winter bones of the family that the summer flesh of corporation, government and religion is layered. Ree Dolly (Jennifer Lawrence) was born into a life of misery. He must be a man. Ree tries to give Jessup's banjo to Teardrop, but he tells her to keep it at the house for him. On the way home from a bar, Ree and her uncle are stopped by the sheriff, who wants to question Teardrop. Humanity’s inhumanity to Humanity takes myriad forms. Winter’s Bone is so aggressively focused on nastiness that it would actually hurt the piece, artistically, if its political content wasn’t slightly nasty too. Winter's Bone is a 2010 American mystery drama film directed by Debra Granik. Thump’s job is to look dangerous and to act with decisive and terrifying violence. This is a theme that cuts right to the heart of Debra Granik’s cinematic adaptation of Daniel Woodrell’s novel Winter’s Bone (2006). Winter’s Bone demonstrates not only that women can be complicit in the oppression of other women but that men can also find themselves forced into a particular social role that they may personally find oppressive and intolerable. The film confirms this by having Ree’s younger brother attempt to fight in order to defend her despite the fact that he is little more than a child. Ashlee Thompson as Ashlee Dolly - Ree's younger sister. The dynamic nature of human oppression goes some way to explaining the extent to which women can be complicit in the oppression of other women. Ree reassures Sonny and Ashlee that she will never leave them. Set in the Ozark mountains, the film tells the story of a seventeen year-old girl as she navigates the terrifying network of hatreds, fears and obligations that holds together her impoverished rural community. This revelation is not so much announced as muttered in passing but it hints at a world of grief not only for Teardrop personally but for his wife and extended family. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one: ). Winter’s Bone (Debra Granik, USA, 2010) is a quest movie with a deadline: Ree Dolly’s father has put up the family home and the land they live off as bond for his bail.As the film begins, we’re told he’s due to go to court but the Sheriff can’t find him. Indeed, when Ree points out to Thump’s grand-daughter that her father cooked crank for Thump, the grand-daughter responds by saying that ‘they all do it’. Yes, a man may well have an easier time rising to the top than a woman but at the same time a lesbian woman may well have an easier time of it than a trans man and a black man may lead a harder life than an asian woman while a one-legged Baha’i woman may find doors opening to her that have previously been shut in the face of a HIV+ Catholic. In the Ozarks, the family is not a supportive environment but the wheel upon which the individual is broken. He is out on bail following an arrest for manufacturing meth. […]. Having examined the social structures that support the authority of the Big Men of Polynesia, Sahlins concludes that by looking at the Big Men themselves, anthropologists have been missing the true nature of political power: “Perhaps we have been too long accustomed to perceive rank and rule from the standpoint of the individuals involved, rather than from the perspective of the total society, as if the secret of the subordination of man to man lay in the personal satisfactions of power. “Winter’s Bone” is a very strange, terrible and at the same time powerful book. Ree is alone in assuming the responsibility for her family even though that responsibility has made it impossible for her to make something of her life by joining the army. Humanity’s inhumanity to Humanity is bred into us by the very institutions that are supposed to protect and support us in the choices we make. The bondsman gives Ree the cash portion of the bond, which was put up by an anonymous associate of Jessup. The film won several awards, including the Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic Film at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. Winter's Bone received widespread critical acclaim, with Jennifer Lawrence's performance being universally lauded. To be in a family is to be a cog in an inhuman machine. According to Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, the face of human oppression takes myriad forms. Sheriff Baskin tells Ree that if her father does not appear for his court date, they will lose the house because it was put up as part of his bond. It portrays humanity as individuals utterly incapable of escaping the demands placed upon them by institutions which, were they human, would be described as psychopathic. With Ree’s father permanently on the lam Ree’s household must rely upon the negotiation skills of Ree’s mother but as she suffers from a mental illness all of the household’s agency is centred upon Ree who lacks the social nous to assume the role of a woman and the physical power and intensity to assume the role of a man. When the independent drama Winter's Bone took home best film and screenplay honors from Sundance 2010, it … * At the end of the film, Teardrop reveals that he knows what happened to his brother. Oscar Nominated indie movie that will leave all of you thinking hard about the merciless darkness in human beings. Winter's Bone (2010) Plot. Teardrop is a terrifying presence. Club put the film at No. […], […] Winter’s Bone (2010) [Ruthless Culture] : Amazing film. The women place a sack on her head and drive her to a pond, where they row to the shallow area where her father's submerged body lies. Ree Dolly is a 16-year-old member of one of the clannish and impoverished families of the area, and the book describes her Homeric search for her missing father, who has put up the family house as security against a court appearance. After a tense standoff, where Teardrop implies that he knows the Sheriff leaked that Jessup was an informer, Teardrop convinces the sheriff to let them leave without any interrogation. Her performance is more than acting, it's a gathering storm. Needless to say, Ree is not overly impressed. It’s a boy thing. The family is destitute. "[8] New Yorker critic David Denby called Winter's Bone "one of the great feminist works in film". Had Thump or his men been involved then Teardrop would have to get involved, the fact that it was women who beat up Ree suggests that there is still some room for discussion and rational negotiation. Notionally patriarchal in structure, these roles oppress men as much as they oppress women because they deprive men of their freedom. [11] The film's distributors Roadside Attractions aimed, concurrently with New York, Los Angeles and Boston, at "heartland cities" such as Minneapolis, Overland Park, St. Louis, Springfield, Dallas and Denver, which eventually all attracted significant audiences, surpassing New York's. His nebulously defined territory is filled with all kinds of vehicles and buildings littered with not only animals but also relatives loyal to him. At this the man smiles and hands back the banjo. William White as Blond Milton - Sonya's husband, a methadon addict. It was adapted by Granik and Anne Rosellini from the 2006 novel of the same name by Daniel Woodrell. Ree's father, Jessup, has not been home for a long time; his whereabouts are unknown. It portrays a community in which women are expected to be submissive to the will of their husbands. Isaiah Stone as Sonny Dolly - Ree's younger brother. When Jessup fails to appear for the trial, the bondsman comes looking for him and tells Ree that she has about a week before the house and land are seized. She is beaten not by Thump or by any of his male relatives, but by his wife and her coterie of female underlings. It was adapted by Granik and Anne Rosellini from the 2006 novel of the same name by Daniel Woodrell. Daniel Woodrell's novel Winter's Bone -- a dark family saga set in the Ozarks — was adapted into a film in 2010. He will not say why. The only men who are not irrational and violent in the film are the nameless and voiceless musicians who provide the film’s rare but hauntingly atmospheric musical interludes. She starts with her meth-addicted uncle Teardrop and continues to more distant kin, eventually trying to talk to the local crime boss, Thump Milton. Upon being handed his brother’s banjo, Teardrop plucks uncertainly at it. The best of these films use the art of storytelling to reveal deep truths about human nature. Ree has been here a thousand times before and she calmly informs the lawman that no, she has not seen her father and even if she had she certainly would not tell anyone where he was. At one point, Teardrop pulls out a plastic bag full of crank and offers some to Ree, who immediately refuses it. This world is established with bleak economy in the opening scenes of Debra Granik's “Winter's Bone,” which was a double prize winner at Sundance 2010. Ree takes the hands to the sheriff, telling him that someone flung them onto the porch of her house. Winter's Bone by Daniel Woodrell is a poetic novella set in the Ozarks - the impoverished and (in this book) icily cold mountain region of Missouri and Arkansas. To be in a family is to be used and to use others. In fact, he does not act by himself. Dismayed at her own family’s reticence to offer help, Ree decides to take her request to the local Big Man Thump Milton (Ronnie Hall). A partial answer can be found in the concept of Kyriarchy. The film stars Jennifer Lawrence as a teenage girl in the rural Ozarks of Missouri who, to protect her family from eviction, must locate her missing father. “I already told you to shut up once with my mouth” he adds menacingly when his wife attempts to press the issue. The film's subsequent outing and expansion to 39 theaters earned $351,317, with an average of $9,008 per theater. It is always changing and yet always present. Auto Focus (2002) – Made Free, Yet Everywhere in Chains, REVIEW – Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988), REVIEW – What Have I Done to Deserve This? The characters in the movie are mostly poor and many of them are physically abusive of themselves and others, but they are not treated with condescension or portrayed as stupid. Casey MacLaren as Megan - Ree's distant cousin. With Jennifer Lawrence, John Hawkes, Garret Dillahunt, Isaiah Stone. 1 on their list of the best movies of the year. Ree tries to go see Milton again and is severely beaten by the women of his family. ♦ Published in the print edition of the July 5, 2010 , issue . Suddenly, the picture starts to snap into focus. [14], Winter's Bone also won Best Feature and Best Ensemble Performance at the 2010 Gotham Awards[15] and it earned seven nominations at the 2010 Independent Spirit Awards, including Best Film, Best Director, and Best Actress. One day, the local sheriff arrives at the Dolly homestead. [16], Interview with Jennifer Lawrence ("Ree Dolly"), List of accolades received by Winter's Bone, "At the end will be her father, alive or dead", "Winter’s Bone Heats Up in the Heartland", "Life in a Shatter Zone: Debra Granik's Film, Gotham Independent Film Award for Best Feature, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), Gotham Independent Film Award for Best Ensemble Cast, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Winter%27s_Bone&oldid=992871085, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. If Ree is born into a life of misery it is because she has been born into a family structure without clear roles and boundaries. « Ruthless Culture, Film Log For The Second Half of 2010 « Ruthless Culture, Films of the Year : The 2010 Edition « Ruthless Culture. Teardrop and Thump are not inherently psychotic, they simply act that way because that is what it means to be a man from the Ozark mountains. Arts and Culture 'Winter's Bone' ... Winter's Bone, which won the grand jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival last January, has a great deal to recommend it. Winters Bone, written by Daniel Woodrell, tells the story of seventeen year old Ree Dolly and her struggles to save her family from the unfortunate circumstance that they have found themselves in. The website's critical consensus states: "Bleak, haunting, and yet still somehow hopeful, Winter's Bone is writer-director Debra Granik's best work yet — and it boasts an incredible, starmaking performance from Jennifer Lawrence. He warns her that if she finds out who did, she must not tell him. In closing, the movie Winter’s Bone deals with many the weaker perspective in the social constructions of gender, class, and race. By trying to appeal directly to the Big Man, Ree is not only offending his followers, she is also attempting to communicate with that which does not exist in order to communicate. Evidently his brother was a much better player than he ever was. Her best friend is entirely sympathetic to Ree’s problem but she cannot lend Ree her truck. In Lawrence, Granik has found just the right young actress to inhabit Ree. However, when Teardrop turns up to speak for Ree, Thump’s women make it abundantly clear that it was they and not the men-folk who beat up his niece. According to Kyriarchy, dominance is not a question of GLBT vs. Straight, Black vs. White, Male vs. Showing all 6 items Jump to: Summaries (5) Synopsis (1) Summaries. Up until that point, the tendency of Ozark women to speak and apologise for their irrational and violent men was taken to be just that; women serving as a social buffer-zone for their men folk. The Winter’s Bone Community Note includes chapter-by-chapter summary and analysis, character list, theme list, historical context, author biography and quizzes written by community members like you. He should have stuck to playing the banjo. And then the breakdowns too, or the evolutionary limits, have been searched out in men, in ‘weak’ kings or megalomaniacal dictators — always, ‘who is the matter?’ An excursion into the field of primitive politics suggests that the more fruitful conception that the gains of political developments accrue more decisively to society than to individuals, and the failings as well are of structure not men.”. Dolly-pere has skipped out on bail but in order to make bail he was obliged to sign away the deeds to his family home. Valerie Richards as Connie - Ree's mentally ill mother. However, this time things are different. There I discussed Ree Dolly, the film’s heroine, in the overwhelmingly white context of Taney County, Missouri, where the median household income is about 75% of the national median. His fingers shake and the noise he produces is far from musical. If Teardrop knows what happened to Dolly-pere then he must act upon that information. Having learned of their father’s death, the children have begun sorting through his things and they have uncovered an old banjo. This is a theme that cuts right to the heart of Debra Granik’s cinematic adaptation of Daniel Woodrell’s novel Winter’s Bone (2006). ‘Kyriarchy’ is a neologism coined by the Harvard theologian Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza. [10], Winter's Bone debuted in cinemas on June 11, 2010 in a limited release in 4 theaters and grossed "a hearty" $84,797, with an average of $21,199 per theater and ranking #35 at the box office. The characters all share the unspoken … Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Indeed, the question is not why would a woman cut off her partner’s penis and throw it out the window of a speeding car but rather why it is not a daily occurrence. 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