Haunting and hilarious is a combo you don’t usually see together in a film. Legendary Director William Friedkin brings about both feelings in easily the most intriguing film of the year. From Pulitzer and Tony Award-winning author Tracey Letts comes a hell of a black comedy. Click thru for our interview with one of Killer Joe‘s leads, Thomas Haden Church.
The ability of Freidkin to capture Tracey Letts wild story-telling and mold it with the dynamic Oscar worthy performance of Matthew McConaughey is purely brilliant. The NC-17 is an element of the film that harps to the lack of intelligence by the MPAA/Film Ratings Organization and also the awesome gall of Freidkin to not give a damn.
In a roundtable conversation with Thomas Haden Church the NC-17 element was compared to crime & punishment and whether those can ever be correctly figured.
And Thomas even talked about how he does see the graphic material as something folks couldn’t handle, well Texans can.
Thomas sums up the NC-17 vs R rating debate by saying no filmmakers would ever “want” the NC-17 rating.
Whew, now that we tackled the NC-17 crux, the film has the rating so don’t think you can wait to buy the DVD after its out of theaters. Go see the film in theaters is the lesson. Thomas had a ton more to talk about and it helps lead to more elements of greatness from the film. First up is the fact that there isn’t really a hero in this film.
Speaking of the cast, Emile Hirsch gives a gritty performance and sure does take a few quality beatings. He also takes part in one of the more well done “chase” sequences. If you don’t know, William Friedkin also directed the The French Connection (so he knows chase sequences).
Gina Gershon gives one of the boldest female portrayals this year and the fact that she bares it all and is totally humiliated in an unforgettable scene, really speaks to her guts for taking the role.
But, the stand-out performance (on top of McConaughey’s greatness) is Juno Temple. The young vixen is utterly spell-binding as the under-aged daughter of Thomas Haden Church.
THC talked about the incredible dynamic between McConaughey and Juno’s characters and how she totally throws Killer Joe off his normal intelligent sensibilities.
THC – Killer Joe’s lack of Power
Thomas Haden Church ended my line of questions by discussing how he was impressed to see the reactions the film got from our screening (the evening before the interview).
THC – My Question about seeing film
Don’t be scared by the NC-17, Killer Joe is a must see for 2012 and can you really not want to see Matthew McConaughey in possibly his finest performance (if you’ve seen Frailty, you’ll love this film!). If you don’t see the film, he’ll come looking for ya.
Find out the latest information about Killer Joe from their Facebook page or the official website.