The Netflix film The Devil All the Time has taken the world by storm since its release a few weeks ago. Everyone is mooning over Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, and Sebastian Stan, as well as realizing how attractive Bill Skarsgård is when he’s not depicting a murderous clown (or is that just me?). But, as with many movies, the plot of this blockbuster comes from a less recognized book of the same name.
Published in 2011, The Devil All the Time was Donald Ray Pollock’s debut novel. It follows a decent sized cast of characters and details the ways their fates entwine, even when they come from different places. The book was well received by critics and even won a few awards, but until the release of the movie, I, and I imagine many others, had never heard of it. After watching a review of the book, I knew that I wanted to read it before seeing the film, and boy, was I glad I did. Reading The Devil All the Time was like getting a slap in the face that I knew I had coming; it might sting, but I couldn’t be mad at it. What else can you expect from a few hundred people living out in the boondocks of Ohio and West Virginia with booze, no money, and way too many guns? Throw in some corrupt lawmen for flavor and you’ve got yourself a party. This is a fantastic book about terrible people and terrible things forced upon the people who aren’t. I had to read it over about a week-long period because of school, but each time I picked it up I flew through the pages. The language had a simple beauty to it; every word was deliberate, not too little, not too much. It is a truly brilliant Gothic novel set in the 1950’s and 60’s and deserves far more recognition than it’s getting right now.
On to the movie. It has a star studded, beautiful cast, Jake Gyllenhaal produced it (does he just show up wherever Tom Holland is?), and Donald Ray Pollock himself is the narrator. I have watched my fair share of book to movie adaptations, and this is no 2010 Percy Jackson movie (even Rick Riordan was ashamed). Given that Donald Ray Pollock had a speaking role, it can be assumed that he had some control over what went into the film. It was strangely comforting to have his voice behind it all, the voice of the story’s original creator, taking the viewer through each event one by one. I felt like the screenwriters really understood the essence of the novel, and were very careful with how they shaped the plot to be more cinematic. Many critics have lauded Tom Holland and Robert Pattinson for their performances, and they were excellent, but I think this movie really showed Bill Skarsgård’s range as an actor. He went from playing Pennywise the dancing clown in both installments of It to being Willard Russell, a young man who has seen and done unspeakable things, but is ultimately just trying to be a good husband and father in a world that has done him more harm than good. Harry Melling, who played Dudley in the Harry Potter movies, reemerged from the woodwork in this movie and is almost unrecognizable from his days at No. 4 Privet Drive. There were a surprising number of British actors in the cast, which was slightly comical to me considering the setting of the movie couldn’t be more American.
The women in The Devil All the Time’s cast were also incredibly talented, especially Riley Keough as Sandy, but the men were the focus of both the novel and the film. While that is usually something that I find slightly irritating, I actually quite enjoyed it in this context. Through each storyline, the reader or audience is shown what exactly makes a man good, what makes a man evil, and what makes a man broken. We are shown the emotions and worries of men that we usually don’t get to see, and, although it may be violent at times, it truly is a beautiful thing. I recommend this story to anyone. I realize more will probably watch the movie than read the book, but as a lover of reading, I urge you to pick up a copy, even an audiobook. The novel has so much depth to it that watching the movie I was able to “read” between the scenes and visualize the parts that hadn’t been shown on screen. Whether or not you choose to follow my advice, this story is not one that should go unnoticed. While reflecting on a very different time, it shows us the generations we are still so close to, and how little things really change as the decades go by.
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