Winter's Bone has a stunning performance by newcomer Jennifer Lawrence as Ree Dolly, the 17-year-old whose relentless search for her father is the spine of the plot.

Unless he turns up, dead or alive, the bond he placed on the house to get out of jail (he's a meth cooker) will default and Ree will lose the house, along with the ability to care for her catatonic mother and two little siblings. Her search is almost entirely among her kin, or what I would call her tribe, as hard-bitten a crew of mountain men and women you're going to find. The ending, set on a lake, is wonderfully Gothic and grisly.

My problem with the movie is what I would call the fetishization of hillbilly culture. The camera dwells a little too lovingly on every sign of hick destitution that can be imagined. I didn't see any snake handlers or toothless women smoking corncob pipes, but here's my checklist of what's in the movie: banjos, rusted refrigerators on front porches, dogs, derelict vehicles in yards, junk everywhere outdoors, dogs, clothes hanging on clotheslines, broken-down sheds, roads with no center stripe, dogs, squirrel huntin' and squirrel guttin', firewood splittin', outdoor livestock butcherin', everyone is armed, dogs, all men are bearded, someone sits on a tire, mountain music jam in someone's living room, serious wrinkles (women included), dogs, lumberjack clothing, deer stew, greasy baseball hats, a burned-out abandoned house and, of course, methamphetamine. Also, do people who are not in John Wayne movies really say "scatter gun" instead of shot gun?

This culture is hardly unique to the Missouri Ozarks. I've seen it in lots of places in the mid-Atlantic, including the coal regions of Pennsylvania and in western Maryland and West Virginia. But wherever you find it, you will also see folks who mow their lawns and keep flowerbeds, who have well-kept vehicles in the driveway and whose yards are free of junk. In other words, poor people who live with dignity. This belongs in the mix and Winter's Bone doesn't show it, no doubt for "artistic" reasons.

Also, a scene at the end in which cash is handed to Ree seemed hokey and out of place. Can't well enough just be left alone??

Kudos for a compelling story, lively dialogue and vivid performances. But there's a bit too much of this "check out these weird backwoods crackers" going on in an otherwise solid film noir.