Hard Evidence
Lee Daniels' The Paperboy is cinematic trash of the lowest order; a film so horrible and unrepentant in its search and subjection of suffering that here, over 24 hours after seeing it, I am still trying to get the taste out of my mouth. Beyond that, this film is hard evidence that Precious may well have been an incredible fluke. No filmmaker working in the confines of proper taste and art could create and release a film such as this. It is a baffling exercise in exploitation trash, and off the top of my head, the worst film I have ever seen to have competed for the Palme d'Or at Cannes. More baffling still is the 16-minute standing ovation it received at its premiere; had I been among that audience, not only would I have been sitting, but I would have been wondering who these people are around me that will applaud this film for any amount of time, no less sixteen minutes.
I was and am still defensive of the quality of 2009's superbly written and acted Precious, for which Lee Daniels received an Oscar nomination for Best Director. With Precious, Daniels was working from a screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher; perhaps therein lay one of the overarching issues with The Paperboy - Daniels wrote this script. I can only call this poorly directed because I cannot imagine a good director entertaining the idea of releasing this upon the world. Nonetheless, its direction does have some cinematic polish that hearkens back to films of the late 60s, particularly in its cinematography (the story itself is set in 1969).
The story, narrated by a black maid (Macy Gray), recalls the events surrounding the murder of a small-town Sheriff in the summer of 69, and the man charged with his murder now sitting on death row, Hillary van Wetter (John Cusack). The main character, though I can hardly call him interesting or even very active, is Jack Jansen (Zac Efron) who spends most of his time in his underwear. If he isn't already in his underwear at the beginning of the scene, there will probably be a reason for him to exit the scene with less clothing.
One day, Jack's older brother, a reporter, Ward (Matthew McConaughey) comes to town with his friend, also a reporter (the film is defiantly inexact as to who works with or for whom, and what their respective stations are), Yardley (David Oyelowo). Yardley is a black man who has now entered the regressive backwoods of Florida in the late 60s, where racism is still surely afoot. Ward and Yardley are intent on proving Hillary's innocence, though it is entirely unclear why they buy into that idea in the first place. Along for the ride, I suppose with the intent to be some sort of help to the two reporters, is Charlotte (Nicole Kidman), one of those oh-so-common women who fall in love with prisoners. She has been corresponding with Hillary, and is convinced of his innocence; I won't say why, but damn does she have a good reason (#sarcasm). Charlotte draws the attention of Jack, partially because she is beautiful, partially because she's older and his mother is gone, blah blah blah.
The story carries on, never quite as we expect, which normally I would applaud, but not when it decides to turn left and we know the only reasonable choice was to go right. There are two scenes, earlier on in the film, that have received much attention; one, a meeting between Charlotte and Hillary where neither can touch each other yet still manage to achieve orgasm, and two, a scene of such epically narrative bewilderment in which Charlotte urinates on Jack after he's stung by a jellyfish. I won't even repeat the dialogue in that scene, which is acted with comedic zeal but portrayed as dramatic sincerity.
If there exists one saving grace for this film, it is a commonplace adjective applicable to most any Lee Daniels film: it is well-acted. However, unlike Precious, these performances have no backbone; they are treading water in a sea of misguided themes and a beguiling story. Matthew McConaughey can add this to his resume of impeccable performances in 2012, but I won't blame him if he doesn't want to. Perhaps the most fascinating turn is with Nicole Kidman, who sheds her decades-long glamour type-cast to embody a character as melodramatic, trashy, and sexily charged as the film itself. So far she has earned SAG and Golden Globe nominations for her work; I can't say it is undeserved. But I do wonder why any of these actors read this script and signed on. Roger Ebert once said that, generally as a rule, John Cusack doesn't appear in bad films. At the time, I honestly couldn't think of a horrible film I had seen him in.
I certainly can now.
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