Dallas Buyers Club

Dallas Buyers Club – Dir. Jean-Marc Vallée (2013)

We are living in the McConaissance. Matthew McConaughey first charmed audiences as the lovable stoner David Wooderson ("Alright, alright, alright.") in Richard Linklater's "Dazed and Confused." He cemented his status as an actor to watch, particularly due to projects like Lone Star and Frailty. However, McConaughey became a punch line thanks to his Southern twang, his willingness to go shirtless, and a string of lackluster romantic comedies. In recent years, he seems to have taken the criticism by heart and re-dedicated himself to the craft. He turned down the easy payday for a big screen version of Magnum P.I. in favor of working with renowned directors such as Jeff Nichols, William Friedkin, Martin Scorsese, Steven Soderbergh, and reunited with Linklater for Bernie. Despite only being in two scenes, McConaughey is one of the best things in The Wolf of Wall Street. The crown jewel of McConaughey's recent output is Dallas Buyers Club, a performance that earned him a slew of accolades including a Golden Globe and an Oscar for Best Actor.

Based on a true story, Dallas Buyers Club features McConaughey as Ron Woodroof, an electrician and rodeo cowboy with a predilection for promiscuous sex and drugs. He's not the most enlightened fellow either. Woodroof reacts with disgust when Rock Hudson's affliction with AIDS became public and casually tosses around a few racial epithets. An accident at work sends Woodroof to the hospital where Drs. Sevard (Denis O'Hare) and Saks (Jennifer Garner) break the news that he too has AIDS and only has 30 days to live. Woodroof angrily storms out of the hospital. How could he possibly have AIDS when he's an all-American heterosexual? That is, until he remembers having sex with an intravenous drug user. Woodroof is evicted from his home, loses his job, and is shunned by his family and friends. However, he's hardly resigned to his fate.

At first, Woodroof bribes a hospital janitor to get AZT, a drug with the best results for fighting the disease, but whose side effects can be just as debilitating. When he runs out of AZT, Woodroof meets a doctor in Mexico (Griffin Dunne), who points him towards other medication that have not been approved by the FDA. Driven by self-preservation and profit, Woodroof makes frequent trips to Mexico, Japan, and Europe to stockpile drugs. He establishes the Dallas Buyers Club with a membership fee of $400 that will allow other AIDS patients access to medicine not available in the US.  As he battles government bureaucracy, Woodroof finds his attitude changing, especially when he forms an unlikely friendship with Rayon (Jared Leto), a transgendered woman also suffering from AIDS.

When the AIDS epidemic first began to sweep the country, those who were sick and their loved ones faced an uphill battle against the spread of misinformation and prejudice. Under the Reagan administration, the government did little to stem the tide. After all, gays and drug addicts were not exactly their constituency. These early days of AIDS activism were captured with amazing detail in How to Survive a Plague, my pick for best documentary of 2012. Dallas Buyers Club isn't as rabble rousing. This is an intimate character study focusing on just one of the many powerful stories of that era.

The real Woodroof died in 1992, a full seven years after the doctors' grim prognosis. Shortly before he died, screenwriter Craig Borten (who co-wrote the script with Melisa Wallack) interviewed Woodroof and set about to tell his story. The film has been in development ever since with actors like Woody Harrelson and Brad Pitt previously attached. Borten stuck by the production though you wish a little more subtlety was introduced during the lengthy writing process. The writers don't paint in shades of gray as evidenced by a scene with a room full of butterflies meant to symbolize his spiritual transformation.

It's a credit to McConaughey's abilities that he's able to sell corny lines like, "Forget about the FDA. I'm gonna be DOA." Physically, he went through a grueling transformation by staying out of the sun and dropping nearly 40lbs to play the gaunt and ailing Woodroof. No matter his outward appearance, there's no hiding McConaughey's innate charisma and likeability. Another role destined for awards season is Jared Leto, who netted the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Leto is no stranger to body transformations having lost weight (Requiem for a Dream) and gained weight (Chapter 27) for other movies. Leto disappears into the character of Rayon with assistance from the award winning make-up team.

Dallas Buyers Club follows all the established steps in creating a critical darling. This is an inspiring true story with a pair of performances that required radical metamorphoses. It's hard to fault the filmmakers for adhering to the formula when they've done so with spectacular results.

Rating: *** (*****)

Magic Mike

Magic Mike - Dir. Steven Soderbergh (2012)

Magic Mike could easily be dismissed as "that male stripper movie." Indeed, the ad campaign seems to sell it as fun times with a beefcake bonanza. The fact that 98% of the audiences I saw attending the screenings opening weekend were female deems the marketing a success. However, don't go in expecting Magic Mike to be a campy, gender-reversed version of Showgirls. The movie is surprisingly deep and a bit of a bummer. You can thank director Steven Soderbergh for bringing a little substance to all the glittery thongs and bare buttocks on display. Magic Mike is the male companion to Soderbergh's The Girlfriend Experience with a dash of Flashdance and Boogie Nights thrown in for good measure.

The titular Magic Mike is played by Channing Tatum, who was inspired to make the film by his time working as a male stripper after dropping out of college. The screenplay was written by his producing partner Reid Carolin.

By day, Mike is a part-time construction worker and owns an auto detailing van though we never see him do any of the latter. At night, he is the star attraction at Xquisite, located in the heart of the bustling nightclub scene of Tampa, Florida. Mike doesn't want to strip forever. He has aspirations of running a custom furniture business. He crafts tables from the flotsam and jetsam that wash up on the beach. That encapsulates one of the primary themes in Magic Mike, finding a purpose for the unwanted debris of society. Right on cue, Mike meets Adam (Alex Pettyfer), a college dropout sleeping on his sister's couch. Adam blew a football scholarship after punching out his coach and gets fired on the first day by the foreman. Safe to say, he has impulse control issues.

Mike takes Adam under his wing and nicknames him, "The Kid," where he joins a small cast of well-toned studs that includes Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello), Tito (CSI: Miami's Adam Rodriguez), Ken the living doll (Matt Bomer), and former dancer turned emcee Dallas (Matthew McConaughey). As Adam descends deeper into his hedonistic lifestyle, Mike finds potential for a fresh start and a pure romance with Adam's sister, Brooke (Cody Horn).

Magic Mike is a lot more thoughtful than the ad campaign would have you believe. Yes, there is a lot of flesh with Tatum dancing up a storm and dusting off his Step Up moves. The club isn't a normal strip club, but a dance revue where the men perform elaborate skits dressed as firemen, sailors, soldiers, and cowboys. Yes, there is the obligatory number set to "It's Raining Men." Surprisingly, the film has more female nudity than male as we get a Tatum butt shot within minutes quickly followed by a topless Olivia Munn.

The story is steeped in the current zeitgeist of country's economic fallout. This theme is never more apparent than a scene in which Mike fails to secure a small business loan (he's considered distressed) from a bank representative played by Breaking Bad's Betsy Brandt. Mike rifles off a great comeback line, "I watch the news. Ya'll are the ones who are distressed." Magic Mike shares similarities with The Wrestler in that both feature protagonists selling their bodies to survive. While Randy the Ram destroys his for the entertainment of the fans, Mike must keep his in pristine condition. The comparisons go further when you note that one of the strippers is Kevin Nash, a 7ft. tall former professional wrestler. Nash is in his fifties and has two bad knees due to a litany of injuries. In the movie, he is Tarzan and dances in a loincloth with an obvious leg brace because he doesn't know how to do anything else. He's the cautionary tale, the road where Mike may be headed.

Mike himself is played with easy-going charm by Channing Tatum, who has never been considered one of today's great thespians. But, Soderbergh knows how to utilize his actors within their own limitations. He made Gina Carano into a believable action star through stoicism and a terse amount of dialogue. In The Girlfriend Experience, he had porn star Sasha Grey exude a cold detachment that could have been a wooden performance in any other movie. In Magic Mike, he lets Tatum be himself, a loveable lug who sometimes stumbles over his own words. Tatum's scenes with Cody Horn are some of the film's best. When Soderbergh keeps the camera at a distance, he makes it feel as if the audience is eavesdropping on a pair of young lovers. The reviews of Horn's performance are all over the map. A few critics have bashed her for being cardboard or that she only got the job because her father, Alan Horn, chairman of Walt Disney Studios and former president of Warner Bros, who produced Magic Mike. I choose to give her a thumbs up. Just like Tatum, Horn gives a naturalistic performance. You cannot say the same for Alex Pettyfer, who lacks the charisma and presence of his co-stars, particularly Matthew McConaughey. The handsome actor with the trademark Texas drawl has undergone a career resurgence. No longer content with doing crappy romantic comedies with Kate Hudson, McConaughey has taken on daring low-budget projects with directors such as Soderbergh, Richard Linklater (Bernie), Jeff Nichols (Mud), Lee Daniels (The Paperboy), and William Friedkin (Killer Joe). He exudes McConaughey-ness in the role of Dallas and draws your attention whenever he is on screen, not just because of his shiny washboard abs. There's also a hint of a dark side to his character, someone who isn't above exploiting his employees.

Soderbergh gives everyone a unique look. He takes the nocturnal world of the Tampa club scene and washes it with an orange and yellow glow. During a scene where Mike and Adam attempt to snare a couple girls to their club, Soderbergh shoots it from a high angle long shot where they are just a few bodies in teeming sea of humanity. He then flips it to a closer low angle where the girls are hooked and they are now the only people in the world. Another memorable shot is of Big Dick's namesake appendage being fluffed by a pump, which is in the foreground corner of the screen and slightly out of focus with Adam in the center background staring quizzically at it.

Magic Mike isn't an entirely original story. It's a tried and true cautionary tale of show business with all the requisite dangers of sex, drugs, and backstage drama. But, the cast is superb and Soderbergh gives it his unique stamp.

Rating: *** ½ (*****)

Ghosts of Girlfriends Past

Ghosts of Girlfriends Past - Dir. Mark Waters (2009)

Please understand I only saw this damn movie because I promised to take my sister to see it. I did not go to this fucking film of my own volition.

Matthew McConaughey showed promise once. He had a memorable turn as stoner David Wooderson in Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused. He had another strong performance as a small town sheriff in John Sayles’ Lone Star. Since then, McConaughey has been content to coast on his good looks, insufferable smirk, and Southwestern drawl through one god-awful picture after another. His most recent efforts include the festering turds that were Fool’s Gold and Surfer, Dude. At least he seemed to have some fun with his image in Tropic Thunder as Ben Stiller’s agent, a role originally meant for Owen Wilson.

McConaughey headlines yet another romantic comedy, playing up the cocky man-whore character that studios seem to believe audiences will flock to. This time around he stars as Connor Mead, a superstar photographer, in this modern day take on Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. In the film’s opening moments, we immediately learn the depths of Mead’s douchebaggery. He strips a girl’s clothes off then has an archer shoot an apple off her head with a bow & arrow for a magazine cover, all without her consent. Mead STILL manages to worm his way into her panties even while he’s dumping three other girlfriends during a webcam conference call.

He returns home for his younger brother Paul’s (Breckin Meyer) wedding and is reunited with childhood friend Jenny Perotti (Jennifer Garner). There’s plenty of sexual tension between the two and an obvious flame carried by both, though neither would admit to it. After a few drinks, Mead spews some rhetoric condemning the concept of love and the institution of marriage. While taking a leak, he’s visited by the ghost of his late Uncle Walt, a loathsome lothario, played wonderfully by Michael Douglas as a cross between Hugh Hefner and Robert Evans. Uncle Walt is the Jacob Marley of the picture and warns Mead that he’ll be visited by three ghosts in order to save him from his loveless life of one-night stands. During one ghostly visit, we get a glimpse of the Walt Chamberlain level of boning Mead has devoted his life to as he sees every single woman he ever slept with. Taking into account the law of averages, it's a miracle he hasn't caught herpes, genital warts or even a bad case of the crabs.

Of course, Mead’s playboy image is a mask to hide his insecurities and fear of being hurt. We get the obligatory fight between the leads even though they’ll wind up in the end. It’s all so formulaic that I wonder if there were actual screenwriters typing this out or if they didn’t just cut and paste it from a bunch of other scripts. Looking at their credits on IMDB, writers Jon Lucas & Scott Moore were also involved in the stinkfest known as Four Christmases. So we have another cinematic abortion to blame them for.

Girlfriends Past isn’t a total loss. Jennifer Garner does her best even if her character is bogged down by uninventive and unconvincing displays of wit. Miss Garner does deserve better than to be trapped in the hell that is the female lead in every romantic comedy (AKA Meg Ryan). The film is saved by Douglas and another pair of funny supporting performances. The first from Emma Stone as the nerdy ghost of girlfriends past and the second by Robert Forster as a retired military man and father of the bride.

Rating: * 1/2