Review: Dallas Buyers Club

Dallas Buyers Club (annoyingly lacking in apostrophe) is a dramatisation of the life and work of AIDs patient Ron Woodroof, played by Matthew McConaughey as a foul-mouthed Texan hellraiser. Electrician by trade and cowboy by nature, Woodroof hangs out at the local rodeo with his good ol’ boy buddies and spends his winnings on prostitutes and Bud. Unluckily, he winds up contracting HIV with a life expectancy of 30 days. Keen to ‘die with my boots on’, Ron shuns the harmful pills of the hospital and sets about importing unapproved drugs. Ever the American, the lone rider builds a business selling these life-extending narcotics, using various tactics of subterfuge to stay one step ahead of the authorities and keep it all legal.

The power of Dallas Buyers Club lies mainly in the acting. Matthew McConaughey, who always sounds like he has a whistle trapped in his throat, has been the toast of Hollywood recently with a steady flow of respectable roles. Gone are the rom-coms of the past; in are outlandish acceptance speeches at award ceremonies. In addition, he garnered frenzied speculation when the paparazzi spied his dramatic weight loss demanded by the role. But for all the hype, he simply turns in a terrific performance. The Lone Star State native must feel comfortable in Texan backwaters, because there is a documentary realism as he swaggers around in boots and Stetsons, drawling and shooting across the screen. Similarly deserving of praise is Jared Leto as Rayong, a transvestite Marc Bolan fan who is also HIV positive. S/he becomes Woodroof’s business partner, but is perhaps more troubled by the whole situation. Leto manages to capture someone in what is a fairly unimaginable predicament, handling the emotional variation with a restrained intensity. Although less dramatic, Jennifer Garner is quietly beguiling as a doctor struggling with her conscience.

Contrary to tradition in the Western genre, Ron cannot simply ride out of town. He is stuck bang in the middle of the crisis, and any departure from the action would be due to departure from the mortal shore. Some critics have called it conservative and rampantly capitalistic. This ignores the progression of Ron Woodroof. Initially, he is a very traditional, predictable rebel. When he really sticks two fingers up at the world is when he starts running with the ‘tinkerbells’ he loathes and sells his Cadillac to spread the meds. Sure it’s a bit of a cliché – bigot forced to revalue his prejudices – but this convention is barely noticeable. Any film based on real events will send the history nerds scurrying off to Wikipedia, and there are inevitably some departures from the truth. Woodroof was a real guy, but elements of several other figures were inserted, and by all accounts he was less of a bull riding redneck. Again, this is minor criticism.

It is fitting that a topic like this should be difficult to watch in places. Much of it is indeed harrowing: AIDs victims cough blood and trundle drips around; patients lie like sacks of wasting bones; doctors discuss the disease in sterile, morbid wards. There would have been a danger of not doing the issue justice, but this has been entirely avoided. Dallas Buyers Club also does a good job of critiquing the pharmaceutical business without being too earnest. It takes issue with selling medical aid to make money, yet it is never distracted from the personal plot by its own worthiness. With the brazen enthusiasm of its roguish protagonist, and some of the subtlety he lacks, Dallas Buyers Club brings an important issue to the screens with acumen.