Winter's Bone themes and production

Independent film

• Two year pre-production to find poverty stricken locations in rural south, Ozark mountains.
• $2 million budget.
• $5500 spent on costume, swapped clothes with residents there.
• Film shot in several family properties (alyson, fox, cook).
• Unknown actors.
• Shot on high-res Red DV camera.
• Shot on location.
• Sound of voices and music of voices (poet realism).

Themes

• Family.
• Secrecy, silence and threat.
• Innocence.
• Relationships.
• Women and patriarchy.

Debra Granik

Background

• Made educational films for trade unions.
• reworked snake feed into first feature, "Down To The Bone", story of mother trying to overcome drug addiction.
• Granik and writer Ann Rosellini given pre-publication copy of Daniel Woodrell's novel, Winters Bone (2006).

Process

• Uses "organic, incremental process".
• Documentation of daily lives.
• Location shooting.
• Neo-realism