I read recently how the great 20th century Southern writer Eudora Welty joked that the first questions a southerner asks upon meeting a newcomer are “who are your people?” and “where are you from?”. In the consciousnesses of the vast majority of southerners - even to this day - clan, family, and community are the windows through which all of life is primarily viewed. The few southerners who do not view the world accordingly are more than likely transplants from the North, migrants and misfits in the southern world of SEC football, sweet tea, and deep fried vegetables. Southerners are defined by their family names, their hometowns, and their work. That is why old southern families give their children christian names based after familial last names, why entire towns root so entirely and so passionately for local football teams - on the high school and college levels - and why many farmers and small businessman strive tirelessly in their cotton and tobacco fields, in their shops and store rooms, as big business scythes and corporate plows destroy a way of life so intimately a part of southern history and life.

For many years, this community-centric view of life was the inspiration for some of the greatest artists and works of art American culture has ever known, especially in the world of fiction. Joining Miss Welty in the canon of classic southern literature are notables like Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner, Walker Percy, even Harper Lee, and more recently Wendell Berry. Indeed, at the very heart of the stories these authors wrote was (or is) a firm belief in the power of community as redemptive force and place as a source of hope, themes without which their work would be radically and indistinguishably different. Welty grew up in, and was highly influenced by, the Mississippi back country, whose distinguishing habits and personalities her job as a journalistic photographer allowed her to observe closely. Faulkner too was shaped by his life in rural Mississippi. Read the rest of this entry »

Since I’m a movie buff, the summer movie season has always been my favorite time of year. Sure, it usually doesn’t yield Oscar-fare like the fall does but it’s jam-packed with so many big budget extravaganzas bent on melting my brains that I can’t help but get excited. The 2008 summer movie season kicks off with a very special movie, for which I have been waiting nearly 20 years to be released - the 4th installment in the INDIANA JONES saga, INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL. Read the rest of this entry »

I know that every blogger and his grandmother has had something to say recently about the Ben Stein starred documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, but the film is important enough to share a few thoughts for this edition of the Friday Film Focus. You see, dear Into the Hill readers, this film (which is about the debate, or lack thereof, between those who believe in Intelligent Design and those who believe in Evolution) has some wonderful things to say - downright important things to say, in fact - is a really fun cinematic experience, and includes one of the coolest CGI explorations of a cell I have ever seen (I could watch those few minutes again and again and again). However, it also is clearly biased and teeters on the edge of Read the rest of this entry »

The last few editions of the Friday Film Focus have “focused” on the role that viewers and film makers take on when engaging with one another through the cinematic art form. Now, for the next few weeks I will be presenting selections of various film- primarily fairly recent, fairly independent and foreign films - that have important or interesting things to say about Read the rest of this entry »