‘Hillbilly Elegy’ Review Round-Up: Ron Howard’s Shameless Oscar Bait Drama Is Very, Very Bad

In 2016, J.D. Vance published his memoirHillbilly Elegy, which became a nationwide sensation after the election of Donald Trump, with media pundits scrambling to understand Trump’s influence over the rust belt states, or “Trump country,” as it was dubbed. Four years and one Trump presidential election loss later,Ron Howard’s adaptation ofHillbilly Elegyhits Netflix and the Oscar contender circuit, complete with transformative scenery-chewing performances from Oscar nomineesGlenn CloseandAmy Adams. Maybe it was the ill timing, or the blatant Oscar bait, butHillbilly Elegyhas not been well-received by critics in their recently released reviews.

See our round-up ofHillbilly Elegyreviews and early buzz below.

Before we get to the reviews, here are a few Twitter reactions toHillbilly Elegy, which range from vehement dislike to apathy, with some praise for Glenn Close and Amy Adams' performances.

Goes without saying: Amy Adams deserves better than HILLBILLY ELEGY. She’s done a fantastic, empathetic, grounded performance as a working-class woman before … in THE FIGHTER! So I’m baffled by every scene of hers here playing like it’s the one for her Oscars clip montage.pic.twitter.com/0phsc9uxX6

— Marshall Shaffer (@media_marshall)July 01, 2025

HILLBILLY ELEGY: Didn’t care for the movie or performances. Structurally, it’s a mess and on the whole, painfully uninteresting. And I say this as someone who’s a sucker for underdog stories. It’s never a good sign when “Why should I care?” is what you ask yourself after a film.

— Tomris Laffly (@TomiLaffly)August 20, 2025

sooooo i didn’t hate#HillbillyElegy, but i also can’t really defend its existence and its lack of impact. it is extremely middle of the road to forgettable

— Candice Frederick (@ReelTalker)August 08, 2025

Amy Adams and Glenn Close elevate well but#HillbillyElegyis just the wrong movie at the wrong time and feels like the cinematic equivalent of “all lives matter” & there are “very fine people on both sides.” J.D. Vance’s story unfolds like a Hallmark channel Sunday morning reel.pic.twitter.com/gY3jBl1LJd

— Clayton Davis (@ByClaytonDavis)June 22, 2025

And now onto the reviews, all of which are fairly negative toward Ron Howard’s Oscar-contending drama.

Vanity FaircallsHillbilly Elegy"prestige bait that uses an awfully rusty lure, tossed with careless pride from its ship of Hollywood fools," expanding:

The Playlistwrote that the film “fails as a drama” and is “even worse as a commentary,” losing even the sociopolitical themes of its original text, J.D. Vance’s memoir of the same name, which blew up in the aftermath of the 2016 election after the media leapt to the “authentic” depiction of Trump country:

Voxreviewer Alissa Wilkinson callsHillbilly Elegy"possibly the worst movie I’ve seen in years," writing:

I am surprised it’s as bad as it is. Written for the screen by Vanessa Taylor (The Shape of Water,Hope Springs) and directed by Ron Howard, it is distractingly Hollywoodified, a rich person’s idea of what it is like to be a poor person, a tone-deaf attempt to assuage a very particular kind of liberal guilt by reifying the very thing that caused the guilt in the first place. And, perhaps worst of all, it’s a very dull movie.

Varietypraises Amy Adams and Glenn Close’s performances for their “down-home flamboyance,” but callsHillbilly Elegy"Ron Howard’s otherwise overly safe adaptation":

Indiewirepraises “an excellent performance from Glenn Close,” but writes “this apolitical adaptation can’t save J.D. Vance’s memoir from its own self-interest.” The review writes:

Uproxx’s Mike Ryan muses that he doesn’t know “whoHillbilly Elegyis for. Well, except maybe J.D. Vance.” He writes:

In its review,AV Clubhopes that “Hillbilly Elegy [will] mark the end of Trump-era myth-making about the white working class”:

To give it just a small crumb of credit,Hillbilly Elegy, the new Ron Howard film based on J.D. Vance’s 2016 memoir of the same name, doesn’t play as an apology for the toxic racism of white America. But like thoseNew York Timesprofiles, it views its subjects as zoo animals, offering the same enduring stereotypes about Appalachia—namely, that it’s full of people too ignorant to realize that they’re being victimized by their own bad choices—peddled by Vance’s book.

The Hollywood Reporterwas one of the kinder reviews, calling the film “sympathetic but less than stirring portrait of hard-bitten lives”:

Hillbilly Elegydebuts in select theaters around the country this week ahead of its Netflix streaming debut onNovember 24, 2020.