Dallas Buyers Club (Jean-Marc Vallée, 2013)

[Murdoch]

I'm surprised there's no thread for this yet given the multiple Oscar noms and it appearing on several members' lists. McConaughey and Leto certainly went through a physical transformation for their respective roles, and as highly lauded as the performances are in the film I think it's much more than a "performance film" (i.e. a film whose only merit is the quality of the acting). I liked that the film isn't afraid to cast Woodroof in a bad light, showing his homophobia and bigotry before his diagnosis, nor does his acceptance of Rayon feel artificial or forced. Also, while most biopics about a person fighting for a cause cast that person as a benevolent do-gooder, Woodroof is clearly a man motivated by self-interest, which is understandable given that Woodroof is trying to survive himself. I also found the editing on the film to be very well done, and while the time cards early on were awkwardly used, the film rather smoothly transitions from Woodroof as a boozing electrician to drug entrepreneur. Overall a very well-made biopic, which is not a genre I'm normally keen on.

Those are my scattered thoughts on the film. I may have more to say later but I just finished it and was very impressed.

[barryconvex]

i just watched this the other day and was impressed with it as well...mcconaughey is the lead but it's jared leto (who i could not stand as either an actor and/or as a frontman for a "rock n roll" band) who walks away with the movie. he was born to play this part. i hope he wins every award there is..

[Sonmi451]

I agree. This is very close to my top 10 for the year, which is well beyond what I expected from it. McConaughey is really a revelation; where did his transformation these past couple years come from? My only wish is that Leto's character was developed a bit more, but that is a minor concern. The film was always going to have difficulty sustaining the vibrancy of the 1st act, given the subject matter, and I'm not particularly a fan of Garner in this role (or, I suppose, any other really), but it was certainly compelling throughout.

[barryconvex]

i thought one thing the film did really well (among others)...

SpoilerShow

was to keep the reason for mcconaughey's infection somewhat of a mystery. the flashbacks are deliberately shadowy so you can't tell if he's engaging in straight or gay sex. was he a self-hating, closeted bi-sexual? i thought he probably was and it added another dimension to an already well drawn character...

[mfunk9786]

i thought one thing the film did really well (among others)...

SpoilerShow

was to keep the reason for mcconaughey's infection somewhat of a mystery. the flashbacks are deliberately shadowy so you can't tell if he's engaging in straight or gay sex. was he a self-hating, closeted bi-sexual? i thought he probably was and it added another dimension to an already well drawn character...

Glad you mentioned this, I had the same thought and felt it was something that was handled well... but ultimately the structure of this film was a bit off for me (a lot of cutting immediately following a bit of silence and then a quick line... disorienting and inexplicable) and the ups and downs of the DBC weren't very well defined. The film gets into a loop of showing things running smoothly, then a bust, then things not going smoothly for a while, then a fully functioning operation again... Vallée doesn't do a good enough job with the narrative structure to make this completely work. But McConaughey and Leto are fantastic, and worth the price of admission. A pretty good film that I would never discourage anyone from seeing.

[knives]

On that account the real person was in fact bisexual, though I believe he wasn't self hating.

[rohmerin]

I loved it.

[AquaNarc]

wait, what? the opening scene explicitly shows him having unprotected sex with a woman (women?) and then later he flashes back to this after he finds out he's HIV positive.

I hadn't read that the real Woodruff may have been bi, that's interesting, but I'm not sure where you guys are seeing ambiguity in the film?

[Roger Ryan]

wait, what? the opening scene explicitly shows him having unprotected sex with a woman (women?) and then later he flashes back to this after he finds out he's HIV positive.

I hadn't read that the real Woodruff may have been bi, that's interesting, but I'm not sure where you guys are seeing ambiguity in the film?

SpoilerShow

The flashback memory that Woodruff has in the library is of him having a three-way with a man and woman. The man is shown to have needle marks in his arm implying he is an intravenous drug user. The ambiguity comes in because we don't actually know if Woodruff himself has had sexual contact with the man or not. I feel the flashback is meant to imply that Woodruff suspects he contracted the HIV virus from the man because they were both having unprotected sex with the same woman at the same time. However, given the circumstances of this ménage à trois, it's not much of a stretch to believe that Woodruff may not be as completely straight as he claims. For the film's character arc (as opposed to the real story of Woodruff's life), it's important that the protagonist learns to move past his bigoted viewpoint into one of acceptance. That the film blurs the edges of this development a bit is to its credit.

[TMDaines]

I really enjoyed this too. The biggest compliment you could pay to both McConaughey and Leto is that their transformation feels incidental to their performances. They both deliver far beyond a crash diet and cutting weight. It is the quality of acting that sticks in your mind the days after and not just an shocking departure from their previous image.

i thought one thing the film did really well (among others)...

SpoilerShow

was to keep the reason for mcconaughey's infection somewhat of a mystery. the flashbacks are deliberately shadowy so you can't tell if he's engaging in straight or gay sex. was he a self-hating, closeted bi-sexual? i thought he probably was and it added another dimension to an already well drawn character...

I'm glad other people brought this up, as I can't be the only one who was struggling to identify whether the third person in the opening scene was male or female.

[Murdoch]

I didn't even notice a third person (I must have glanced away) so thanks to everyone for drawing my attention to a rather important detail.

[Professor Wagstaff]

I also didn't notice a third person in the room or anyone with needle marks. I thought the key phrase that Ron picked up on in his research was 'unprotected sex' and remembered this one occasion with a woman in a motel (which I considered odd as Woodruff didn't strike me as a guy who found it necessary to use condoms all the time).

[Roger Ryan]

There are two different scenes shown. The scene at the film's open shows Woodruff with two women (this is after he has been infected since the film opens with him in a relatively weakened condition). The flashback memory shown in the library scene shows Woodruff with a man and a woman. The recall of the needle marks on the man's arm convinces Woodruff that this must have been the night he contracted HIV. Given how sexually active he was, this may or may not have been the time he actually contracted the virus, but the recollection is what opens Woodruff's eyes to the reality of his condition.

[Sonmi451]

Just re-watched the scene and -- unless there are different versions -- it certainly appears to be just Woodruff and a woman. The track marks are on her arm.

[Roger Ryan]

Just re-watched the scene and -- unless there are different versions -- it certainly appears to be just Woodruff and a woman. The track marks are on her arm.

Fair enough - I only saw the film once and thought I was seeing a tattooed, muscular male arm with needle marks but, then, the scene is shot and edited in a very oblique way.

[Sonmi451]

Just re-watched the scene and -- unless there are different versions -- it certainly appears to be just Woodruff and a woman. The track marks are on her arm.

Fair enough - I only saw the film once and thought I was seeing a tattooed, muscular male arm with needle marks but, then, the scene is shot and edited in a very oblique way.

Certainly, I had trouble recognizing McConaughey myself.

[barryconvex]

it's not so much the flashback as the scene in the trailer...

SpoilerShow

Mcconaughey and a friend bring a woman home (i don't recall if she was a prostitute) who ultimately has sex with the friend only. Mcconaughey declines intercourse because he learned earlier that day he's tested positive for hiv, although he's still in denial about it. while it's obvious this particular friend would never have homosexual sex with anyone, least of all Mcconaughey, Woodruff and his crew come across as hedonistic, insatiable people. Woodruff himself was every bit the hustler (as well as a heavy user) early in the movie and the possibility that some kind of prior homosexual incident involving a different group of people was very much in the air. i could also very easily believe he'd done it for the money at some point like so many other addicts before and after him. Mcconaughey's appearance in this movie reminded me alot of john holmes' appearance after he himself had contracted hiv. specifically the drawn and gaunt john holmes who had to resort to making gay porn towards the end of his life because he was broke. i doubt this is a coincidence and that i'm the only one who picked up on it...

i have no interest in knowing if the real ron woodruff was bi or straight. i'm only reacting to what the movie gave me, and how it gave it to me. and for me it's lack of a certain clarity about that issue deepened the relationship between woodruff and rayon (and the rest of the gay members of the buyers club)...

[Never Cursed]

AIDS activist Peter Staley claims that the original script of this film espoused AIDS denialist ideas, and that screenwriters Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack were thrown off the project (and the script partially rewritten shortly before filming) after butting heads with Staley and Vallee over these elements

[swo17]

Gee, no parallels to our current situation whatsoever!

[Zot!]

I'm not sure if I'm an auteurist, but the level of cinema by committee here is frightening.
How they are going to conform the story of one flawed man's self-medicating drug operation to support any of these highly entrenched positions is rather dubious.
Lets add some more title cards shall we?

[Never Cursed]

In a world where most golden age studio Hollywood scripts, great or terrible, passed through half a dozen writers and a domineering producer to get made (not to mention the modern style of production endemic to the MCU where the director isn’t the one directing most of the film), that four people did some revisions to the script of this film before shooting doesn’t really strike me as cinema-by-committee. Assuming that what Staley is saying is true, these revisions only made the film better