Filmmaker at The Noisy Philistine
Associate Professor of Film Studies and Communication at Carson-Newman University
Appalachian/Southern/Postcolonial/Global
Disability and Elder Rights Advocacy
Featured Works
Nashville-based, global scope. Specializing in documentary, narrative media, music video, and commercial.
Intelligence, substance, resonance.
In an age when anyone with a camera and a laptop can claim status as a media professional, Noisy Philistine knows that the most important element of any production is the idea behind it–an idea developed with our clients, cultivated through a rigorous pre-production process, and fully realized with a crew dedicated to using every artistic and technological tool in its service. We make engaging and intelligent media for those looking to push boundaries and connect to loyal yet savvy audiences. Our work spans multiple genres and scopes from documentary and music video to commercials and long-form non-profit projects. We strive to find the right balance of style and substance to exceed expectations and capture the spirit and individuality of every client with whom we collaborate.
A grocery bagger with cerebral palsy must confront others’ perceptions and his own delusions as he vies for the affections of a coworker. Online premiere TBA. Currently in development as a feature film. Follow us on Facebook.
A webseries that aims to preserve and promote the narratives of The American South’s elder population and engage with current debates about “The Global South.” Produced and directed by Jerod Ra’Del Hollyfield, the pilot season focuses on 14 residents of various senior-living communities in Bowling Green, KY. Each future season will shift to a new Southern city and filmmaker to highlight the diversity of the South and its filmmaking community. Ultimately, the project hopes to release 1-2 seasons a year and expand to cities throughout the South from West Virginia to Florida. Watch Season One. Season 2 will focus on Nashville, TN, and is directed by Ryan Estabrooks and produced by Hollyfield.
“‘Interfidelity,’ combining a film adaptation’s faithfulness to its source text and culture with its ability to talk back to them, may sound like an oxymoron. In the hands of Jerod Ra’Del Hollyfield, however, it becomes a potent tool for examining eight Hollywood adaptations that open urgent new questions about Victorian classics, colonial discourse, and filmmaking industry practices. Anyone who writes about the politics of adaptation should read Hollyfield.”
~ Dr. Thomas Leitch, Professor and Director of Film Studies at the University of Delaware and author of Adaptation and Its Discontents
This book examines postcolonial filmmakers adapting Victorian literature in Hollywood to contend with both the legacy of British imperialism and the influence of globalized media entities. Since decolonization, postcolonial writers and filmmakers have re-appropriated and adapted texts of the Victorian era as a way to ‘write back’ to the imperial centre. At the same time, the rise of international co-productions and multinational media corporations have called into question the effectiveness of postcolonial rewritings of canonical texts as a resistance strategy. With case studies of films like Gunga Din, Dracula 2000, The Portrait of a Lady, Vanity Fair and Slumdog Millionaire, this book argues that many postcolonial filmmakers have extended resistance beyond revisionary adaptation, opting to interrogate Hollywood’s genre conventions and production methods to address how globalization has affected and continues to influence their homelands. Purchase options.
Selected Work
Essay: “Approximate Others: Peter Weir’s The Last Wave.”
Narrative Film: “Haircut Days”
The story of one man’s haircut ripples through Tennessee, inspiring some and repelling others. Utilizing a frame narrative, the movie explores how stories are experienced, told, re-told and ultimately claimed.
Haircut Days from Davis Hunt on Vimeo. Produced by Jerod Ra’Del Hollyfield
Music Video: “I Think I Think Too Much” Born Animal
Narrative Film: “A Dream Come True in New York City”
Read The Tennessean article on the film’s premiere. Festival cut coming soon.
Essay: “Granny Fees for Apple Pie: Gender and the Settler South in Moonshine Cinema.”
Essay: “The Limits of Orientalism: Relocating Identity in Two Arabian Nights.”
Essay: “Defining Neverland: P.J. Hogan, J. M. Barrie, and Peter Pan in Post-Mabo Australia.”
Music Video: “Easy on the Game” MELD
Bio
Dr. Jerod Ra’Del Hollyfield is an Associate Professor of Film and Communication at Carson-Newman University, an Appalachian College Association institution. He received his PhD in English and film studies from Louisiana State University and degrees in English and electronic media from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. A native of Appalachia, Hollyfield remains committed to Southern stories and seeks to produce work that calls attention to and collaborates with individuals from groups whose exclusions are often ignored, especially those in the region’s disability and senior communities.
Hollyfield’s short film, “Goodfriends” (2013), screened at over a dozen film festivals, including the Nashville Film Festival, Indie Memphis, and the Ft. Lauderdale International Film Festival and was endorsed by national disability organizations. It was nominated to apply to the Sundance Institute’s invitation-only 2014 Screenwriters Lab. Hollyfield also created The Assisted Stories Project–a collection of video essays that aims to preserve the narratives of the South’s elder population. He is the producer of A Dream Come True…, a fiction-documentary hybrid with a cast comprised of adults with disabilities that will begin its festival run in 2019. Most recently, he produced the short “Haircut Days,” set both in Appalachia and Hollyfield’s current hometown of Nashville that asks, “Who has the right to tell Southern stories”?
Hollyfield’s academic research examines American cinema within a settler-colonial context. His book, Framing Empire: Postcolonial Adaptations of Victorian Literature in Hollywood was released in 2018 by Edinburgh University Press. His other academic work has appeared in several academic journals and edited collections.
Clients
Jerod Ra'Del Hollyfield 