Z/Web

I just heard about this History Channel miniseries yesterday, reading that it got the highest ratings of any cable show ever (beating out all the main networks in prime time). I didn’t know anything about the Hatfields and the McCoys other than they had a famous bloody feud. Since it sounded interesting, I started watching it.

I couldn’t stop. It affected me deeply, which is fascinating. I don’t like war movies, and family squabbles annoy me, but this was done in such a way that it felt like regular everyday humans caught in a terrible web of their own making. I felt sympathy for almost every character; most were just woefully foolish, and even the villains had their good sides. The filmmakers brilliantly set things up so neither side is completely right or wrong, and there’s a sense of inevitability about the characters’ fates and situations.

I really liked that the film gave us insights into the characters to show that though they made stupid decisions and let their emotions rule their actions, they were not dumb. Often they were quite clever, in devious ways.

I was also fascinated by how much I learned: I never realized the feud involved so much legal wrangling (the families were bordering states, West Virginia and Kentucky, and that created all sort of legal complications in terms of extradition). Aspects of the feud went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to get it figured out.

Best of all, I’ve often heard that in these kinds of feuds that after a while, no one really knows who started it or why. Even with a film adaptation like this, that happens — by the end you can’t remember how it started either. It’s just a long series of minor inconveniences, insults and slights, and unfortunate accidents that devolves into violence, murder, and all-out war. While I’m sure this film version isn’t exactly what happened, it is brilliant in how it conveys a realistic way such a thing might have happened.

In terms of negatives, it’s a little hard to keep track of the many characters dying all over the place (though not as bad as I expected), and I also wasn’t always sure of the timeline (occasionally text came up mentioning the year, but not often enough). There’s an ill-fitting and unconvincing love story which feels like an obvious rip-off of Romeo and Juliet and that bothered me at first, but it is very interesting and creates some good drama.

Overall, this is an incredible and mesmerizing story, well-directed and performed, with an amazingly believable set. It’s tragic and shows the stupidity of feuding, but in a way that’s realistic and human, making you think this could happen to you or people you know. Heart-wrenching.