One of the blogs that I read was from a woman named Barbara Taylor Woodall who lived in the area at the time Deliverance was filmed. She goes in depth on how to people of the town viewed the movie. She talks about how outsiders actually viewed the movie as a science fiction film. She tells us some of the locals who were cast in the film were recruited based on their looks, but they weren’t told what the movie was about. The locals didn’t know that the Ed Neely’s character was going to be the victim of a homosexual rape by one of the mountain men.

Throughout the film, some of the property was actually altered to make it look worse. The locals did know about the famous dueling banjo scene. Even that scene had its flaws. The young boy was cast solely on the fact that he looked “splay eyed.” One thing that she says that stood out was how she says she could here adventurers squealing like pigs when they went down the river, making fun of the famous scene.

She talks about how the movie was very stereotypical. In her blog, the movie is actually claimed to be the most degrading depiction of southern mountaineers ever put on film. Woodall tells us, “Deliverance powerfully reinforces a stereotype I have been fighting most of my life: that of the hick with his liquor still, ignorant, depraved, stupid, and laughable. It’s that stereotype that convinces viewers, mountaineers have no worth, have no value and can be taken advantage of without an ounce of guilt.” It is apparent that after the movie she and the other locals felt as though they were treated as animals just for the sake of money. Even to this day she still sees t-shirts and bumper stickers that say “paddle faster, I hear banjo music.” It’s not fair to the generous people who lived there that were degraded by Hollywood.

http://itsnotmymountainanymore.com/deliverance-stigma