The Sinister Culture Shift
The affable, simple-hearted hillbillies of 1960s television took a dark turn with the 1972 thriller Deliverance. Starring Burt Reynolds and Jon Voight, the film casts urban adventurers in a nightmarish encounter with menacing hillbillies in the American backwoods. The tension escalates as the city dwellers’ disdain clashes with locals’ resentment over impending environmental devastation due to a planned dam.
Ned Beatty’s character, Bobby, epitomizes this contempt, dismissing the locals with, “People? What people?” The haunting strains of “Dueling Banjos” and the chilling command to “Squeal like a pig!” have since etched themselves into the collective memory, symbolizing deep-seated fears of the unknown lurking in rural America.