Killer Joe
Director: William Friedkin
Year Released: 2011
Rating: 2.0
Idiot theater presents: Morons behaving like morons! Deep in debt, Chris (Emile Hirsch) hires police officer/contract killer Joe (Matthew McConaughey) to off his Momma for the insurance money, but he's unable to pay Joe up-front and uses his flighty sister/Earth child (Juno Temple) as collateral. It's not enough that you have to follow around these hicks and their poor decision-making abilities (though the cast is talented enough to try to make that work), but then it reaches its sensational - and frankly ludicrous - conclusion in which blood flies everywhere and Gina Gershon's whorish step-mother is forced to fellate a fried chicken stick by cruel ol' Joe. Some of the black comedy aspects work in places, but this is fragile as satire of both poor Southern living and America's obsession with violence and killers: one leaves the film talking about the grotesque conclusion - and maybe McConaughey's marvelously creepy performance - but not much else.
