Dallas Buyers Club

Film (2013)

With Matthew McConaughey (Ron Woodroof), Jennifer Garner (Eve), Jared Leto (Rayon), Denis O’Hare (Dr. Sevard), Steve Zahn (Tucker), Michael O’Neill (Richard Barkley), Dallas Roberts (David Wayne), Griffin Dunne (Dr. Vass)

Ron Woodroof, a hard-drinking, hard-living rodeo performer, finds out in the mid-1980s he is HIV positive and so begins a saga of his own energetic attempt to survive while bucking the conventional wisdom of the medical system. To do so, he invents a pharmaceutical buyers’ cooperative to get drugs and supplements, not otherwise available, for HIV/AIDS patients.

Though based largely in fact, the screenplay embellishes aspects of Woodroof’s actual story.

I somehow missed this film when it came out and am really glad to have caught it while still on the big screen; it is beautifully directed, acted and edited.

Matthew McConaughey’s performance as Woodroof is strikingly good; at almost every turn, he is uncannily convincing. He obviously lost a tremendous amount of weight to shoot the film and his emaciated look is testament to his incredible devotion to the part.

McConaughey’s role selections over the past several years have marked a brilliant turn in what had been a rather insipid pretty-boy career. His recent starring performance in Mud (2012) and even his brief supporting role in The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) indicate a decision to explore the darker side; he has risen to the occasion brilliantly.

McConaughey’s performance here, Christian Bale’s performance in David O. Russell’s otherwise less than stellar American Hustle (2013), and Leonardo DiCaprio’s delivery in Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street represent a series of recent male thespian accomplishments among a trio of actors who might as easily have settled for less grim and challenging roles but rose admirably to them.

Jennifer Garner’s Dr. Saks is understated but quietly potent. Garner provides a sedate determination that gradually raises her considerable magnetism up from an initially mousy demeanor.

Jared Leto gives a rare and wonderful performance as the transvestite Rayon, with whom Woodroof engages in business, and eventually, friendship. It is a powerful, charming, funny and moving portrayal.

For those who have watched the Boston theatre scene over the years, it will be of interest to see Steve Zahn (Tucker), who graced the stage of the American Repertory Theatre a couple of decades ago as a student at its Institute For Advanced Theater Training.

Also, in the acting curiosities department, one may remember the youthful Griffin Dunne (Dr. Vass) as the star in Martin Scorsese’s After Hours (1985).

The film editing by Martin Pensa and Jean-Marc Vallée is extraordinary. At every turn it is intelligent, economical and inventive. It is rare to see a film so ingeniously put together. Nor is its editing finesse so evident that it steals thunder from the substance of the film. It is just brilliantly done and makes what is already an outstanding film even better.

Alongside the fabulous recent documentary about the grassroots Act Up movement of the 1980s and 1990s, How To Survive A Plague (2012), this film helps to fill out a sense of the power and energy behind those who, afflicted by HIV/AIDS, failed to give up hope and drove the wider culture to take medical alternatives seriously.

The story, those based largely in fact, is narratively enhanced.

Rayon and Dr. Saks are fictional characters, and the actual Ron Woodroof was apparently not initially as homophobic as the film suggests. The hospital authorities who, in the film, turn into villains, were in fact considerably less confrontational and difficult. Nonetheless, of such narrative alterations drama is made.

As with all fictionalizations of history, there is some gain and some loss. As was the case with the recent film about the public relations fight for democracy in Chile, No (2012), there is a lot that is not historically accurate. This is biographically-inspired drama, not documentary; one must take its history with a grain of salt to best taste its inspirations. A bit like Shakespeare’s history plays, this exceedingly well made drama hovers in that curious realm between fact and fiction. Though not the most reliable reportage, the art here is undeniable.

– BADMan