The South Never Plays Itself by Ben Beard

Author:Ben Beard
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781588384249
Publisher: NewSouth Books
Published: 2020-11-02T00:00:00+00:00

Trapped, also known as Baker County, U.S.A., is a low-budget horror movie from 1982, wild and terrible. It’s a scrawled letter from the nightmare world of Tennessee hillbillies. It’s dumb and offensive, but also strangely compelling. It takes coddled college students and dumps them into a world of incest and rape and murder and torture, the world of Deliverance.

College kids, young witnesses, vengeful hunters and rednecks, the country sexpot, and a government worker held prisoner—it’s a crowded movie. It’s also a nudie flick and a bit of a torture film, merciless and grim. The government worker is beaten, tarred and feathered, debased. It’s cat and mouse between the civilized and the uncivilized, and yes it’s bad.

The script is terrible, with lines like, “You bitch!” and “He’s gonna kill you!” and “You’re not gonna get away with this, man!” The movie does capture the lawless nature of mountain communities. The documentary The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia covers the same territory, only with more verve, humor, and panache. Plus, it’s true.

I don’t have any larger lesson or point to draw from Trapped. But it’s a good counterpoint to show how good Deliverance really is.

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