About the title
The film adaptation of the novel of the same name by Donald Ray Pollock tells the story of a tiny town in Ohio during the period between World War II and the Vietnam War. Grief-stricken Willard Russell is ready to do anything to save his dying wife. He begins to pray to the heavens for salvation, forgetting about the rest of the world, as a result of which his son is forced to transform from a downtrodden schoolboy into a resolute man capable of taking matters into his own hands. He is forced to defend himself and his family from the vices that have mired their little town. The devil has many faces and appears in the guise of a preacher far from saintly, a corrupt sheriff, a couple of perverts, and everyone who long ago forgot about God.