Lack of good storyline.

A Disappointing Continuation

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

Honestly, I don't know why anyone would consider this movie to be a documentary. Then again, I suppose that calling it such is just a convinient way to catalogue it as opposed to quibbling over it being a mockumentary instead.The movie mentions Hazard as being the closest town. Congratulations, that's where I've grown up. Believe it or not, there is actually an amount of economic prosperity there that people wouldn't believe. Why do I say that? Because Rory Kennedy goes to great lengths to make very sure that it is never seen and depict Eastern Kentucky as a Twilight Zone holdover from the 1890's, only with newer vehicles.In a movie meant to showcase the determination and the ability of a family to survive in extreme economic hardship, I simply wonder how hard Ms. Kennedy had to work to make sure that this was the most blatantly discriminatory piece of work that she could come up with. Granted, you had people that didn't work, but moving wasn't exactly an option. To give up a home that you have, in a place that you know to move somewhere but not have the funds to establish a home is always a good move, is it not? The accusations thrown around about Clint have also been amusing since Paris Hilton has proved to be far worse than Clint ever thought about being. I'd also like to point out that the locale was terribly convinient. The difficulty in getting jobs into Eastern Kentucky is due to these wonderful stereotypes and the fact that this film could have been done in ANY state in the nation doesn't deter anyone for an instant.I honestly, in good faith, cannot recommend this film. It is a textbook case of making sure that the footage fits what you want to depict. I do not care what Rory Kennedy has to say, this film is nothing more than a series of strung together scenes meant to make a family struggling to get by into another, stereotype-perpetuating joke. God save us from another elitist moviemaker.

I have witnessed first-hand much of the family dynamics that is portrayed in this documentary, and it is sad that people are so poor. What has never failed to astound me however, is the pride and ignorance that keeps these poor people from leaving the area or progressing. Amazingly, when they do leave, they keep coming back. This film not only shares the pitiful life style of America's poor, but also captures the deep level pridefulness of those unwilling to progress and change their lives they are so discontented with. This attitude surely is ignorance and fear which is far more disturbing than poverty.

If Rory Kennedy meant her documentary, "American Hollow," to show us a poor Southern rural white family as something more respectable than the disparaging hillbilly stereotype, she failed.Not only were those familiar stereotypes not dispelled in this film, they were played out before us.The film offers us snaggletoothed, alcoholic louts given to ridiculing their wives and kids. We see amazingly good-humored, unprotesting womenfolk who do all the work of keeping the family together and fed, with little help from the men.The chronically unemployed men in the Bowling family simply won't leave to find work and a better life outside the hollow in their part of Kentucky where there are few job prospects.Worse, they actively encourage failure in the "young'uns" as well.I suspect we're supposed to believe that the Bowlings are nevertheless noble because they have deep roots on the land they've been unemployed, impoverished, and uneducated on for generations. My grandparents came across the Atlantic to America because they couldn't make a living in the old country. I think that's far more courageous (and American) than staying in a lousy situation with no hope.Poor rural black folks have to contend with racial discrimination when they go to the city for job opportunities. By contrast, the Bowling men, most of them blond, wouldn't have that hurdle to jump. But no, they stay resolutely mired in their hollow.I'm a pretty soft-hearted person, but I lost my respect for the Bowling men in the first ten minutes of the film.However, even if most of the subjects of this documentary aren't appealing, the film itself is well-made. I did learn one thing from "American Hollow" -- that love-sick teenage boys and the sweet young things who lead them on are the same the world over.

Absolutely one of the best films this year. Compelling, well-shot doc about a big family living in a Kentucky ravine. The film shows wife abuse in such a sad way that it strikes the heart. But it also shows the pride of living off the land, particularly through the work of an elderly woman. Tragic and incredible.