Dallas Buyers Club
DALLAS BUYERS CLUB (15)
D: Jean-Marc Vallée
Focus Features/Truth/Voltage (Robbie Brenner & Rachel
Winter)
USA 🇺🇸 2013
116 mins
Drama/Biopic
W: Craig Borten & Melissa
Wallack
DP: Yves Bélanger
Ed: John Mac McMurphy & Martin Pensa
Matthew McConaughey (Ron Woodroof), Jennifer
Garner (Dr. Eve Saks), Jared Leto (Rayon), Steve Zahn (Tucker), Dallas Roberts (David Wayne), Bradford Cox (Sunny), Dennis O'Hare (Dr. Sevard)
McConaughey achieves a rare feat in this movie and
that is to make you root for a wholly unlikeable character.
He plays homophobic, drug-using, philanderous
trailer-trash Ron Woodroof, diagnosed with AIDS and given only 30 days to live, he smuggles unapproved medicines into the US to prolong his own life and then uses loopholes in the law to make
money helping other sufferers, charging them $400 membership for a club where they'll get their monthly medicine for free.
This really is McConaughey's career best performance and
there's another great performance from Jared Leto as cross-dresser Rayon, so convincing, you'd be forgiven if you thought it was actually a real woman.
Another surprise was the performance of Jennifer Garner as
Ron & Rayon's doctor. Usually I think she's a rather poor actress, but she's very good in this.
Inspired by true events, Dallas Buyers Club isn't quite
the best movie to tackle the subject of AIDS, but it does tackle a lot of ignorance regarding the deadly virus, especially since it's set in the mid-80's when it was still dubbed 'the gay
plague'.
The two main performers, McConaughey and Leto, are in
their absolute element here, while excellent makeup completes the transformation. All three disciplines won Oscars for the 2013 awards.
8/10
