Bill Bryson and Steven Katz didn’t really know what they were getting into when they began their Appalachian Trail journey, recounted in the newly released movie “A Walk in the Woods.” From the moment Katz shows up for the adventure — limping, overweight and prone to seizures — to the time an attempt at traversing a stream sends both men flailing in the water, ineptitude is part of the comedy. 

But conservation and tourism organizations along the AT are hoping they won’t find themselves similarly unprepared when thru-hiking season starts up this spring. Featuring stars such as Robert Redford, Nick Nolte, Emma Thompson and Nick Offerman, the movie is expected to appeal to a wide audience, putting the Appalachian Trail at the forefront of many minds.

I was a little apprehensive.

Strolling into The Strand at 38 Main this past Friday evening, the buzz around downtown Waynesville was the premiere of “Chasing Grace.” A faith-based thriller, the film was shot in town and around Haywood County. But, how would it fare on the silver screen?

There are plenty of Ron Rash fans who have been waiting — and waiting — for “Serena” the movie to come out, and they won’t let all those bad reviews rain on their parade.

Just because something looks good on paper doesn’t mean it’ll work in method.

Case in point, the new Hollywood film “Serena,” which is a silver screen adaptation of the Ron Rash novel of the same name. The book, a Great Depression-era murder drama amid the Western North Carolina logging industry, was a New York Times bestseller, with the film roping in two of the hottest stars in modern day cinema — Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper.

It’s been nearly a century since the logging boom swept across Appalachia, but the story is timeless, forever engraved on the landscape and in the psyche of mountain people.

“It permanently and irrevocably changed the entire face of Western North Carolina,” said Jason Brady, a special collections librarian at Western Carolina University.

SEE ALSO:
• Serena a thrilling mix of history and fiction
• Hollywood take on novel a flop?
• Critics be damned, I’m watching it anyway

There are movies that I simply cannot turn off once I stumble into them when I am switching channels, which I do whenever there is a commercial, as men have been hardwired to do since the dawn of the remote control. One of those movies is “Fargo,” by the Coen brothers, which I consider to be one of the five best movies ever made. Another is “Tombstone,” a western that I do not really even consider to be a very good movie, though it does contain an astonishing performance by Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday.

In fact, it is Kilmer’s Holliday that compels me to keep watching every time I find “Tombstone” on cable. I can tell within five seconds exactly where we are in the movie, what scene featuring Holliday will come up next, and what the dialogue is in that scene, even when Holliday and his nemesis Johnny Ringo are trading ominous bits of Latin in their first encounter in the Oriental Saloon.

A major motion picture starring Owen Wilson, Zach Galifianakis, Kristen Wiig and others will be partly filmed at a Waynesville location in mid-July.

Three Haywood County towns will be used as filming sites for an upcoming feature movie. The film — a Catalyst Pictures project called “Chasing Grace” — is a faith-based thriller.

Becky Seymour can see the bright lights of Hollywood from Haywood County.

“Right now we’re in the major infancy stage, but we want to basically put Haywood on the map in the film and television world,” she said. 

As video marketing manager for the Haywood County Tourism Development Authority, Seymour is leading a charge to tap the niche industry. 

By Colby Dunn • Correspondent

For residents of Highlands, the list of things to do in town, depending on the season, can be pretty short and “go to the movies” has never been on it. But the town is filmless no more, thanks to a new program at the Highlands Playhouse that’s bringing in the blockbusters four nights a week.