Stockholm Film Festival

White trash boy Jesco White is a lost chapterof Appalachian otherness in director DominicMurphy's amusingly nutty and gruesome aberrationof the classical follow-your-dreams story arc.The real White was an unknown up until 1991when he was profiled in a Public BroadcastingService series on West Virginian 'outsider'musicians. Let lose on camera for 30 minutes,White proceeded to demonstrate his status as"the last of the mountain dancers" - completewith a performance on the roof of a dog kennel- and to discourse - in what seemed to be a methfueledhaze - on everything from the death of hisfather in a shootout to his substance abuse.

WHITE LIGHTNIN' plays fast and loose withthe facts of White's life. Essentially a tap-dancingroad-trip movie, with WHITE LILGHTNIN' we aredragged along through a whirlwind of sleazybars, violent outbursts, self-mutilation and sheerinsanity - all fueled by wild religious fantasies.Clearly delighted by the backwater scenery ofWest Virginia, Murphy stylistically blends neorealismwith wildly gothic spectacles.

Cast

Edward Hogg, Carrie Fisher, MuseWatson, Owen Campbell

Producer

Mike Downey, Sam Taylor

Script

Shane Smith, Eddy Moretti

Cinematography

Tim Maurice-Jones

Spoken language

English

 

Other films from the Twilight Zone section

See all the festival films from 2009