The final film I watched on Friday was Winter's Bone. As it turns out, I really did watch these in order from ok to great. Winter's Bone and The Kids Are Alright lead nominations for the Independent Spirit Awards, and deservedly so. Winter's Bone is absolutely one of the best acted movies I've ever seen. It was just so convincing, I felt like I was watching real life. This movie is set in rural Missouri and centers around a 17 year old girl named Ree. She is has been left with the task of raising her two younger siblings because her mother suffers from an incapacitating mental disease and her father has been in and out of jail for cooking meth. Her father has recently used their house and land as collateral for his bond and if he doesn't show up for trial they will lose everything. Ree sets out to find her father so she can save her family. It reads as a sad and depressing movie, but it was really more of a tough look at the lives of a lot of America's rural poor. It isn't easy to watch, but it wasn't about tears and misery. It's about the toughness and unfairness that life is for some people. If anything it made me want to go put hams by the doors of those peeling, sagging tiny houses it is so easy to glance over but which pepper the entire south. This is by far one of the best movies of the year and I won't be surprise to see it nominated for more and more awards as the next few months go by. Highly recommended.
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-Emily
