Last week, Where the Heart Is happened to be on TV and I decided to revisit this embarrassingly guilty pleasure. For those of you who don't know, this 2000 film takes place in the American south: first Tennessee and eventually Oklahoma, where the majority of the action is occurs. Based on the popular 1995 novel by Bellie Letts, screenplay writer Lowell Ganz and director Matt Williams inappropriately take advantage of the southern location and depend on the exploitation of the southern hick stereotype for the majority of the entertainment in this film.
Every native southerner in this film is the exact definition of a stupid and low-class hick. And everyone who has a brain in this film has a standard American accent and is NOT from the south. For example, main character Novalee (Natalie Portman) finds herself in the town library researching on how to take care of a plant because she was obviously too stupid to keep it alive. The frazzled librarian Forney (James Frain) becomes frustrated when he realized Novalee does not know what an index is and could barely read above a first grade level. In less than 30 seconds, Forney multitasks by helping Novalee sound out words, shows her the index, while responding to the demands of his sick sister. When Novalee inquires about Forney to a town native, he tells her that Forney is from Main and was going to a very prestigious college before he dropped out and came to Oklahoma to take care of his sick sister. This person literally says that Forney is too smart for this town and figures that he will leave as soon as his sister dies to finish college and pursue a more challenging career. This disparity between educated northerners and slow southerners is one of many examples of how filmakers stereotype southerners. Another example is in a scene with actress Joan Cusack who plays the blunt music agent Ruth Meyers. Character Willy Jack Pickens (Dylan Bruno), the father of Novalee's child, pursues a music career after he ditches Novalee. When he encounters Ruth Meyers (another non-southerner) and tells her his name is Willy Jack Pickens, she says "I bet you didn't even have to make that up, did you?" (IMBD.com). This response implies that he is the epitome of a stupid hick because he even has the perfect stereotypical hick name to go with his lack of brain cells. In fact, every hick character in this film as a hick name: Novalee Nation, Lexie Coop (Ashley Judd), Thelma 'Sister' Husband (Stockard Channing), Mama Lil' (Sally Field), and Americus Nation (Mackenzie Fitzgerald).
The Filthy Critic, who gives us the impression that he is a Southerner, writes his angry and uncensored critique of this film on his website. Entertainment Weekly film critic Own Gleiberman mentions in his review of this film that this is just another movie about "poor white...southern characters". See for yourself the results of using a stereotype for the entertainment of an unsuspecting target audience.
