Philadel...uhh...Dallas

Michael S. Martin

Rating: 3/5

Dallas Buyers Club is structured like the story of a self-made drug baron. Ron Woodroof (McConaughey) sees demand for an illegal product and goes through the trouble of importing and selling it, while trying to keep it away from the prying eyes of the law. But at its core the film is so much more than that.

In 1985, Ron Woodford is diagnosed with AIDS and has to face his own and society’s misconceptions about the disease. In a role that was made for McConaughey, Woodford is a charismatic stereotypical Texan too big for his very literal cowboy boots who is at first in denial about his condition as his homophobic worldview clashes with the AIDS’s reputation as a homosexual disease. When he accepts his fate, he is shunned by his equally homophobic circle of friends whose ignorance makes them afraid even of his touch and saliva.

Woodford tries to get help and inquires about getting onto a clinical trial for a drug called AZT. Upon learning that he may not get treatment but a sugar pill placebo, he bribes a hospital janitor to smuggle AZT out for him. Under AZT his health starts deteriorating, which is where the film’s tone becomes uncomfortably anti-science (something all Imperial students should be dismayed to see in popular media) as it veers towards paranoid conspiracies about the pharmaceutical industry, only glossing over the fact that Woodford’s cocaine addiction might have had a bigger negative effect.

When he is readmitted into hospital, he meets Rayon (Leto), an HIV-positive Male-to-Female transgender. Initially very reluctant to establish any relationship with Rayon, through the film Woodford puts behind his homophobia and slowly fosters -with a few cheesy scenes- a full-fledged friendship.

Thinking that he has no chance of survival at home, he moves to Mexico to try methods unapproved in the US. After being told he had 30 days to live at a time when AIDS was a death sentence, his health starts improving and the entrepreneurial Woodfoord sees a potential market at home. He hires Rayon as his assistant and starts importing different dietary supplements and proteins, and the film turns into a near crime drama where Woodford has to squiggle through customs, find legal loopholes to keep the police away and, when his supply from Mexico is obstructed, travel the World to find new suppliers. This change of tone is particularly well suited as it is when Woodford has to face authority that McConaughey’s passive aggressive charisma shines.

Dallas Buyers Club is an expertly crafted film, creating an entertaining plot with quite a few laugh out loud moments, despite the fact that it is showing the lives of people who are very literally on the brink of death. The film understands this and perfectly blends its boisterous tone with the morbid subject it deals with, and doesn’t shy away from reality with many scenes that are hard to watch, in a good way.

Jack Steadman

Rating: 5/5

_Dallas Buyers Club _wastes less than a minute before drawing you in to the world of Ron Woodruff, the unlikeable, sleazy cowboy who is almost immediately diagnosed with AIDS and told he has 30 days to live. Talk about a ticking clock. This pressing impetus of what little time remains (a concern for the production itself as well – the entire shoot was completed in just 25 days due to budget constraints) lends the film a sense of urgency that drives it perpetually onwards, and acts as a cue for director Jean-Marc Vallée to use a smart system of sharp cuts and “Day X” title cards that ensure Dallas never loses momentum, and never quite settles into any discernable rhythm. Sure, there are moments where it slacks off slightly – but when they’re as transcendent as Woodruff standing in a butterfly tank, revelling in the beauty of life, who cares?

The direction may be smart, and the momentum enticing, but it’s the central performance of Matthew McConaughey that really sells the film here. Woodruff is not a likeable man, full stop – he’s homophobic, sexist, and generally rotten (although he does undergo a rather obvious – albeit still incredibly realistic – character arc to redemption) – but McConaughey’s magnetic performance is such that you can’t help but feel sympathy for a man who feels, above all else, so painfully real. Just watch his AIDS diagnosis – McConaughey runs the gamut of emotions, from anger and disbelief, through depressed acceptance all the way to cocksure denial, and it’s never less than completely believable.

His co-star Jared Leto, appearing from about a third of the way in as transgender Rayon, puts up a strong attempt at stealing the show, completely unrecognisable in how utterly he has embraced his character. It’s a stunningly sympathetic portrayal that – yet again – feels incredibly real. This does leave Jennifer Garner to be somewhat outshone by her two co-stars as the well-intentioned doctor who unintentionally finds herself siding with Woodruff against the medical establishment, but she still turns in a note-perfect performance, with her moment of raw grief – more so than anyone else in the film – being the most heart-wrenching scene by far. Simply done, but impossibly powerful.

Everything else about the film stands up to the high standards set by its central performances – the script is tight and focused, and bears far more flashes of humour than would ever be expected, from all angles. It points a lance at big pharma and completely and utterly nails a system that puts profits over people, while – in combination with some perfect art direction – also expertly paints the picture of the atmosphere of fear that presided over the start of the AIDS crisis. The mis-understandings, the lack of information, the confusion and horror that ran through both the medical world and the real one, it’s all here, and it’s all terrifying.

Dallas Buyers Club is not a perfect film, but perfect films don’t exist. It has flaws, but it’s an incredibly earnest portrayal of a crisis that happened in the very recent past, a crisis that continues to roll on today, anchored by career-best performances from Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto. It’s harrowing, moving, traumatising, but also uplifting in unequal measures. It’s a film that demands to be watched.