KILLER JOE - some thoughts from reviewsmoviebook

KILLER JOE is a visceral and provocative trash-noir film from director William Friedkin - most famous for THE EXORCIST - but more similar in tone to his more recent tour-de-force examination of mutual psychosis, BUG. Shot in three weeks on a $10m budget, KILLER JOE has a similarly creepy, violent, sexually tense, sleazy atmosphere, and is similarly tightly written - and it comes as no surprise that both movies were based on plays written by Tracy Letts, of Steppenwolf Theater fame. 

The movie focusses on a messed up southern family - dumb naive father Ansel (Thomas Haden Church); sexually provocative stepmother Sharla (Gina Gershon); failed drug-dealer son Chris (Emile Hirsch) and the apparently mentally disturbed daughter Dottie (Juno Temple).  The family live in a trailer, want to bump off Ansel's first wife for the insurance money, and hire Matthew McConaughey's Killer Joe to do the job. Trouble is, he wants more than money - he wants the sexually naive Dottie.

The resulting thriller is both a film of double crosses in the standard style, but also a psychological drama about Dottie (Juno Temple) - her violent childhood; her twisted virginity; her seduction; her escape.  More widely, it's about Killer Joe bringing the entire family under his control, resulting in the two set piece scenes of sexual power - the aforementioned with Dottie, that's really at the centre of the film - and the second, likely to become the film's notorious calling card, involving Sharla and a piece of fried chicken.

It's no surprise to find that these scenes have provoked unease in viewers, and in its final reel, the movie really does just go crazy with the violence.  But what I found most disturbing wasn't the movie's violence (particularly toward women) but its humour. Because, make no mistake, this film is funny, particularly in its depiction of caricature  tuna-casserole-eating white-trash.  The genius of the film is, then, Friedkin's ability, to walk the tight-wire between dark comedy, and genuinely horrific violence, in a way that, say, Werner Herzog's BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL NEW ORLEANS, didn't.  I also rather like the casting - Juno Temple is particularly impressive as Dottie, but the real genius move is the casting of McConaughey.  Friedkin has realised that McConaughey's too perfect, too manicured beauty is slightly unnerving and creepy, and harnessed that for the Killer Joe persona - the knowing, sleazy, seductive bad cop.

KILLER JOE is on release in the UK. It opens in the USA on July 27th; in Finland on August 10th; in Russia on August 23rd; in France on September 5th; in Belgium on September 26th; and in the Netherlands on November 8th.

KILLER JOE - in which Matthew McConaughey is, for once, not just a pretty face.

This review is brought to you by Alex:

Killer Joe’s US movie poster features a bloodied piece of fried chicken. This probably tells you all you need to know about what to expect from the latest piece by William Friedkin (director; The Exorcist, The French Connection). Based on Tracey Letts’ play and screen adaptation and exploring the seedy underbelly of American society, this film does not disappoint.

The Smith family are archetypal trailer-trash, bit parts straight from an episode of My Name is Earl or Eastbound and Down. The best thing that can be said about father Ansel Smith (Thomas Haden Church) is that he knows he is stupid. Gina Gershon is masterfully cast as his second wife Sharla, as feisty as she’s slutty, and no fan of Ansel’s hapless son Chris from a previous marriage. Juno Temple plays Chris’ younger sibling Dottie.  They concoct a plan to pay off debts owed by the hapless loser Chris to a local loan shark, by arranging for “Killer Joe” to rub out Chris’ mother Adele. Chris plans to collect her life insurance in Dottie’s name. Matthew McConaughey is counter-intuitively cast as Joe, a local policeman who moonlights as an assassin.

Surprisingly, McConaughey doesn’t disappoint and manages to step outside of his typical Rom Com repertoire to play the title role memorably, one part smooth-talking gigolo-cum-southern gentleman, the other part malevolent predator.

Of course, in true film-noir style the plan goes very wrong, and we see the family twist and swing, throttled by the Gordian knot of their situation as it worsens each time they try to fix it once and for all. It’s very enjoyable to watch, and tension builds to a climactic final scene where we learn exactly how sadistic and evil Joe really is.  Violence is unflinching but interspersed with humour, and characters turn on a dime, one moment charismatic, the next skin-crawlingly vile. Friedkin, who I was fortunate enough to hear in Q&A after the premiere, has said that his work is about the thin line between good and evil in us all. It’s a theme the film forces us to reflect upon.

His examination of the subaltern world of the South-Western United States, where even policemen are crooked and feared, suits the director’s tonal nod to Grindhouse cinema. In fact several scenes seem to have come with specific acting direction towards that genre.

Indeed, Kurt Russell’s unexpectedly good turn in Tarantino’s Grindhouse homage “Death Proof” is reminiscent of McConaughey’s role here as the eponymous Joe. Friedkin has really managed to bring something new out of the actor, and he is fun to watch.

The rest of the cast fits snugly into this hybrid noir-trash flick genre, especially the feral Emil Hirsch as Chris (worth checking out in “Into the Wild”). Relative newcomer Juno Temple (soon to be seen in “The Dark Knight Rises”) portrays Dottie superbly, Lolita-like in her innocence and subversive sexual power. It is Dottie’s control over Joe that is the lynchpin of the plot and as such Temple carries a heavy weight on her shoulders. She acquits herself fully.

Richly deserving of its NC-17 rating in the US, Friedkin’s oddball approach to directing will be called violent and misogynist by his critics. I’ll leave that to the reader to decide, but he has managed to imbue inanimate objects (a tin of pineapple chunks, a fried chicken-leg, a watch carefully removed and laid on a table as foreplay to brutality) with trauma in such a way that the viewer can’t fail to be reminded of the roles they play in this film long, after they have left the cinema. This is part of what makes Killer Joe refreshing. I’m sure I’ll be watching it again soon.

KILLER JOE played Venice, Toronto and Sitges 2011, and SXSW 2012. It opens this weekend in the UK, and on July 27th in the USA. It opens on August 10th in Finland; August 23rd in Russia; September 5th in France; September 26th in Belgium; and in the Netherlands on November 8th.

London Film Fest 2011 Day 12 - BERNIE

“It’s not as bad as people say; he only shot her four times, not five.”

Bernie Tiede was a good, god-fearing man, who went out of his way to please.  His patient, caring manner was an asset as a funeral director, and his willingness to throw himself into small-town life made him beloved by his fellow residents of Carthage, Texas.  So much so, that when it was revealed that Bernie had shot Marjorie Nugent, four times in the back, none of the townsfolk believed him guilty. Oh, they knew he shot her dead, for sure.  But they figured that someone as mean-spirited as Marjorie must have incited Bernie to take leave of his senses for a moment.  Tragically for Bernie, prosecuting attorney Danny Buck, knew full well that despite a full confession, four bullets in the back, and Bernie’s ample use of Marjorie’s money, he wasn’t going to get a conviction. And so, he got the trial moved a mere 44 miles away to Saint Augustine.

The wonderful thing about Richard Linklater’s new fictionalized retelling of Bernie’s true story, is that he allows us to fall in love with Carthage, its quirky inhabitants, and with Bernie himself. So that by the end of the movie, even though we’re sitting in an urban art-house cinema, we too can’t quite believe that any humane jury would convict Bernie, and sit fearful that those no-good inbred St Augustinians won’t do him right.   Because this movie isn’t so much a character-driven crime drama as a Coen Brothers style love-letter to small-town Southern life.   We luxuriate in the broad accents, marvel at the cast-iron certainty of the town gossips as they declare that Bernie FOR A FACT was or wasn’t this or that, and laugh at their incomprehension of Austin hippies.  It’s hard to think of any recent use of faux-documentary talking heads that was as successful and hilarious as Linklaters use of  the Carthage townsfolk – narrating, commenting on, and judging the story at each twist and turn. 

Because I warmed so much to these people, and started to identify so strongly with them, the movie turned from what could’ve been a real downer into effectively a rather heart-warming experience. On one level this was a movie about really nasty aspects of human nature – a man so wanting to be liked that he wills himself into an emotional prison, and a woman delighting in his pain.  But rather than being brought down by the depiction of a bizarrely, horribly, sado-masochistic relationship (emotionally, not sexually, that is!), I left the cinema positively full of faith in humanity. Because Carthage was a small town where ordinary townsfolk new just what was what, and a good guy was  a good guy, even if blighted by a sudden act of rage.

All of which tells you that native East Texan, Richard Linklater, is pretty much in love with Carthage, and doesn’t really make much attempt to give a balanced view of Bernie. Or maybe he does, but the truth really is that Bernie was a good guy, despite the slightly suspect love of the high life that Marjorie bought him. By now, I’m so complicit in the “free Bernie” campaign I can’t even tell. All I know is that Linklater somehow managed to capture both the black humour and the tragedy at the core of Bernie’s need to please.  I laughed a lot, I was fascinated, and I won’t soon forget the tale. Massive praise also to all three leads.  Jack Black gives a more modulated performance than is typical in his mainstream films, as the gregarious, needy Bernie. Shirley Maclaine as mean old Marjorie is just an acting masterclass. Look at the scene where she listens to Bernie sing a duet in a theatrical rehearsal, imagining him singing a love song to her. Her face shows a cynical old woman melting.  And finally, you have to hand it to Matthew McConaughey, an actor who is brilliant in inverse proportion to his screentime.  Banality in mediocre rom-coms turns into piquant cameos – first in TROPIC THUNDER, and now as the fame-hungry prosecutor Danny Buckland. 

BERNIE played Los Angeles and London 2011.