The Torontonian Reviews: The Paperboy

The Paperboy is a sweaty, putrid piece of movie-making, and is one of the worst films I’ve ever seen. The problem here is assuredly not the source material – it is unequivocally, unmistakeably, one-hundred-percent attributed to the directing of Lee Daniels, a filmmaker who has ranged from woah-that’s-bad (Shadowboxer) to cultural phenomenon (Precious).

There are plenty of films out there that are objectively “worse” than this movie, but many of those stinkers are still more enjoyable than the mess Daniels has created. A recent example to satisfy this criticism is Taken 2, a film that by all means is stupid, ridiculous, unnecessary…look, it doesn’t matter what you want to call it: it is a bone-headed film, but still a movie we can see with abyssal expectations and emerge with silly grins on our faces. The same cannot be said for The Paperboy, for the act of watching it is so distinctly uncomfortable, so unusually disgusting and off-putting that I have a hard time not getting the willies remembering it. I want to forget. I want to forget and then bathe in tomato sauce.

The plot – which is better described as a stitched-together monstrosity of subplots – is a perversion of the acclaimed Pete Dexter novel of the same name. Set amongst the humid backdrop of 1960’s Florida, Jansen brothers Ward (Matthew McConaughey) and perpetually-shirtless Jack (Zac Efron) work together to acquit a death row inmate (John Cusack). Adding a wrinkle to the drama is Nicole Kidman’s Charlotte Bless, a woman romantically and mentally obsessed with the case. Unfortunately for everyone involved (that includes us), none of it makes for compelling cinema, especially when the mood pinballs from camp to serious without ever really leaving the bonfire and marshmallow roast.

Sometimes when you watch a movie – especially a really great one – it can be difficult to pinpoint what exactly the director of a film has done or added to the piece to make it their own. We don’t need to get into auteur theory here, but with The Paperboy we see a director who has unleashed his bad ideas and poor execution upon an otherwise salvageable script, not unlike a certain urination scene in the film. Essentially all over the map, Daniels exhibits an unwavering stubbornness to make something weird and intentionally shocking; the result being a confusing melange of styles, camera techniques, and color gimmicks that never feel coherently connected or artistically merited whatsoever. Lee Daniels simply cannot seem to decide on a direction or aesthetic, other than sticky indulgence and making the film as sweaty as possible. There are other issues – the script is inane, the pacing poor – but I’m confident someone less extreme at the helm could have saved The Paperboy from its inevitable walk of shame at the Razzies.

The following must be made clear: that The Paperboy is awful is not a selling point. It’s understood that exceptionally bad movies will attract an audience of camp enthusiasts, but Lee Daniels’ third directing credit is not a “trashterpiece” or “so bad it’s good” or “there’s nothing else on television, honey”. No, it’s just trash: garbage that has been pissed on by raccoons or crocodiles or whatever animal your locale attracts and glossed with the veneer of star power and intriguing trailers. Stay away. Let it die. Just let it shrivel up and die.

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