Homemade Hillbilly Jam, a documentary, will be released on DVD june 24.

In the 1800s a scrappy group of Scotch-Irish immigrants settled in the Ozark Mountains of Southwestern Missouri. Stereotyped as poor, lawless degenerates, these isolated hill folk over time became the butt of countless jokes and earned themselves the name “hillbillies.”

This enjoyable documentary captures the rich and wonderful sounds of “hillbilly” music by following three families of modern-day hillbillies back to the roots of their music-making heritage. Leading the pack is singer/songwriter Mark Bilyeu from the band Big Smith, who has been delighting audiences around the world with his foot-stompin’ repertoire of songs, including some passed down through generations - twisted tales of moonshine and adultery, alongside heartfelt stories of faith and life.

Sumptuously shot on Super 16 film and embellished by old photos and archival footage, Homemade Hillbilly Jam is both a celebration of modern-day hill folk and a vivid reminder of their hell-raising, bootlegging ancestors - all in all a salute to the hillbilly spirit, which refuses to die. A trailer for Homemade Hillbilly Jam can be see on the First Run Features web site.

Born in California in 1968, writer-director Rick Minnich grew up in Kansas, Arizona, and California. Following completion of his undergraduate studies in English literature at Columbia University in 1990, he moved to Europe in search of adventure behind the Iron Curtain. This included working as a camera assistant for Latvian Television in Riga, as a kitchen helper in a Greek restaurant in Berlin, and as an English teacher and translator. In 1991, he began studying film at CalArts, but returned to Berlin one year later as a graduate fellow at the former East German state film school in Potdsam-Babelsberg, where he completed his studies in directing in 2001.

Minnich has written and directed several narrative shorts, as well as three long documentaries, including the prize-winning Heaven on Earth, about the Bible Belt showtown Branson, Missouri. Currently Minnich is putting the finishing touches on his latest feature documentary Forgetting Dad, about the effects his father’s mysterious amnesia has had on his family.