"Dallas Buyers Club" and the Reinvention of Matthew McConaughey

I'm back! After a multi-year hiatus, I'm coming back to my blog to share my thoughts on the nine films nominated for this year's Academy Award for Best Picture. Let's get right down to business with the first of them: "Dallas Buyers Club."

Though Matthew McConaughey gave good performances in some of his early, serious roles in films like "Amistad" and "Lone Star," he was best known for playing relaxed slacker dudes or for taking off his shirt and greasing back his hair in a series of lightweight, forgettable romantic comedies. When he turned 40, however, he seems to have decided to take himself and his career more seriously, and he's appeared in a several surprisingly gritty, sometimes dark films since 2010, proving that he actually has range, power and considerable talent. His lead performance in the film "Mud" in 2012 really got my attention; his character is wary and careful at times, surprisingly trusting and vulnerable at others, and McConaughey had me caring about his character and wondering where he'd been hiding this subtlety for so long.

That same year he gained even more attention for his brazen, raunchy turn as Dallas, the male strip-club owner in "Magic Mike." He's often played keyed-up, self-confident characters, but here he pulled out all the stops and toyed with his greasy lothario image, turning it up all the way until he was simultaneously charismatic and repellant. McConaughey's cameo as a coked-up financial executive in this year's best picture nominee "The Wolf of Wall Street" was a high point of the film: he goes completely over the top, charming Leo DiCaprio's young stock broker character and drawing him into a web of lawlessness and lascivious living with gusto. His perhaps five short minutes of glory had everyone in the cinema around me giggling at his character's complete and gleeful amorality.

McConaughey's most powerful and moving performance yet is that of Ron Woodroof, a homophobic Texan rodeo rider and electrician diagnosed with late-stage AIDS in this year's best picture nominee "Dallas Buyers Club." His performance in this film is my favorite by an actor this year, despite a slate of excellent performances by Robert Redford for "All Is Lost" (an excellent performance that deserved but did not receive an Oscar nomination), Chewetel Ejiofor in "Twelve Years a Slave," Tom Hanks for "Captain Phillips," Bruce Dern for "Nebraska," another physical and emotional transformation by Christian Bale in "American Hustle" and some outlandish scenery chewing by Leonardo DiCaprio in "The Wolf of Wall Street." In "Dallas Buyers Club," McConaughey progresses from playing a strutting bantam carousing, fighting and drinking his way through one-night stands to a fragile and broken man at the edge of death. In short order he goes from a rail-thin invalid fighting for a few more weeks of life to a successful entrepreneur. He uses his brains, wiles and cockiness to provide himself and others with life-sustaining antiviral drugs even if he has to lie, cheat and travel the world under assumed identities to do it. In two hours we see his character (who is based on a real man of the same name) at turns showing vulnerability, rage, total self-absorption and touching selflessness. He's charming, he's disgusting, he's both ordinary and extraordinary, cowardly and self-serving for a time, then outrageously brave minutes later.

While the writing and direction are strong, it's the intensity and sheer force of will behind McConaughey's performance that makes the film hum. We must forget the usually buff, slick and confident ladies' man who comes to mind when we hear his name, and the moment we set eyes on his emaciated form (McConaughey lost fifty pounds for this role) and see the desperation behind his cocksureness, we believe his story and him. His face and character reflect the tiniest changes; he can be a powerhouse of grandstanding explosivity when a role requires it, but the delicious surprise of the past few years has been seeing how much he has learned to internalize a moment and let us see it register on his face without even a word.

Much has also been made of Jared Leto's supporting performance as a transgender woman named Rayon who is herself seductive and charismatic, but is also a drug addict with late-stage AIDS. Like McConaughey's Ron, Leto's Rayon required huge physical transformation; Leto became scarily thin himself in order to play her. His performance is lovely; there's a languid, drugged-out quality to Rayon, but there's also a warm and motherly aspect to her. She is unreliable but she nurtures to the best of her ability, and while vulnerable, she also has a steel core to her that appeals to Ron. Leto plays her with a slightly stoned, rather campy quality that fits her character but must walk a sharp edge between being jokey and being realistic. We must believe that she is real and at the same time a made-up construct, a woman in a man's body who is dealing with a very real drug addiction and a terminal illness who is at times shockingly lucid about it and at others is dreamy and not entirely present. Leto, who first gained fame as the gorgeous but none-too-bright love interest of Claire Danes' character on the short-lived but enjoyable 1990s TV series "My So-Called Life," has never shied away from difficult characters or extreme portrayals; he played a heroin addict in "Requiem for a Dream," and played John Lennon's killer, Mark David Chapman, in the film "Chapter 27," for which he gained over 60 pounds and became all but unrecognizable. He has also had success as the lead singer of his rock band Thirty Seconds to Mars for the past 15 years. In a recent interview with NPR's talk show host Terry Gross on her radio show, Fresh Air, Leto came across as affable but enigmatic; it was often difficult to tell when he was being sincere and when he was pulling Terry's leg. However, his commitment to and respect for his characters was as clear in his discussion with her as it is in each of his performances. Like Matthew McConaughey, Leto has a relaxed, casual slacker-like aspect to him that makes him appear not to take life too seriously, but the quality of both men's performances and their descriptions of the intense and earnest preparation that goes into their roles belies their apparent insouciance.

 Four years ago I found McConaughey an annoying, unctuous presence who appeared to be coasting on his looks and well-worn charm; I now find him one of the freshest and most appealing actors of his generation. He has long been a charismatic figure, and he uses his Texan drawl to wonderful effect, drawing out his words and phrases, letting syllables flow over his tongue like honey in an slow and steady stream when he needs to flatter or cajole. He has a soft, low, lilting voice that reads as both manly and intimate, which is probably why the American Beef Council used him as the voice for their "What's for Dinner" ad campaign for several years and also helps explain his appearance in so many romantic comedies over the past decade.

McConaughey's persona has long been seen as shorthand for confident sexiness, and for many that quickly became tiresome. He can have an easy, seemingly effortless way about him that makes him look as if he's not trying very hard, but in a film like "Mud" we see that he can use such mannerisms to fool the characters around him while letting us in on his private thoughts. In "Dallas Buyers Club" much was also made of his ability to misdirect characters with his smoothness and confidence while occasionally showing us moments of desperation or tenderness. He makes it all look easy; that's why he's a star. He's already won a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Ron Woodroof; I predict that he'll take home the Academy Award for Best Actor this year as well.