Denis O'hare

Layers of real life and movie history combine cleverly in this postmodern horror film, which just might be too knowing for its own good. But at least it's an unusual approach to the genre, offering a twisted retelling of a legend while aiming for some emotional resonance along with the usual violent nastiness. It's also directed with an unusually artful eye by first-time filmmaker Alfonso Gomez-Rejon.

It was a series of unsolved murders in a small town on the Texas-Arkansas border in 1946 that inspired the 1976 movie of the same name, which screens here annually on Halloween. But this year, the screening is accompanied by a copycat murder, which escalates into a full-on rampage. Everything seems to centre around Jami (Addison Timlin), a teenager whose boyfriend was the first victim. After her parents died, she was raised by her straight-talking grandmother (Veronica Cartwright), who continually urges her to take charge of her life. So with the local cops unable to solve the case, Jami teams up with the local library archive clerk Nick (Travis Tope) to get the whole history of these past events. Meanwhile, a Texas Ranger (Anthony Anderson) arrives to head up the official investigation.

Screenwriter Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa gleefully blends fact, fiction and the movies together into a heady mixture of horror movie cliches and shockingly realistic grisliness. In other words, this is both a fictional sequel and a playful true-life drama at the same time, which makes it feel eerily like the Scream franchise. Although this film never becomes a pastiche, and the characters are so likeable that we genuinely root for them to survive the killing spree. Timlin brings the right amount of plucky stubbornness to her role, even if it's unlikely that a witness-victim would be quite so gung-ho about doing her own police work. And there are nice turns from veterans like Cartwright, Ed Lautner (as a stubborn cop) and the late Edward Herrmann (as a nutty preacher) to add some weight.

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In telling this remarkable true story, director Jean-Marc Vallee (The Young Victoria) and his gifted cast keep the characters and events so grounded that we can't help but get caught up in their story. The film never asks for our sympathy, but it earns it over and over again as it explores a disgraceful period in American history when businesses and the government essentially condemned millions to death by withholding proper treatment for HIV and Aids.

It begins in 1985, when homophobic womaniser Ron Woodroof (McConaughey) is told that he has just a month to live. Refusing to believe that he has the same disease that has just killed Rock Hudson, he ignores his doctors (Garner and O'Hare) to find his own supply of AZT, which makes him even more ill. So he heads to Mexico to find a range of treatment the US government has refused to approve, and he imports them himself, creating a members' club to subvert the law. This requires that he set his deep-seated prejudice aside so he can work with the transgendered Rayon (Leto). But a government lawyer (O'Neill) is determined to shut him down.

Yes, it's deeply infuriating to watch the American system try so hard to stop Woodruff from saving lives. Government officials continually outlaw his effective treatments so they can pawn off the toxic, over-priced AZT instead. So Woodruff travels the world in search of new medicine, and his business of course takes off. Vallee cleverly cuts through the 1980s period details to reveal Woodruff's earthy tenacity and an overpowering sense of humanity.

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We meet Angel in the apartment of Nicole (Rachel Griffiths) and her husband Henry (Denis O'Hare). It isn't quite clear what the relationship between Angel and the couple is, but we know he's been invited to sleep over. Only later do we realize that Nicole is Angel's generous social worker, and he has nowhere else to go. Henry is not pleased by the arrangement but tries to engage Angel, with little success. They're from different planets.

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Making a Hollywood story with a decidedly un-Hollywood flair, co-writers, co-directors and co-stars Jennifer Jason Leigh and Alan Cumming take a casual, almost guerilla approach to their collaborative conception called "The Anniversary Party."

It's a shoestring production shot cinema vérité style in which these two gifted journeyman actors play a shaky show biz couple throwing themselves a sixth anniversary bash even though they've just recently and tentatively reconciled after a big infidelity blow-up.

Their guests -- movie stars, directors, industry types and hangers-on -- seem vaguely uncomfortable congratulating Sally and Joe Therrian (Leigh and Cumming) on their longevity under the circumstances. But in a town where fakery is the norm, it's easy for everyone to put on a happy face -- even the non-industry next-door neighbors (Denis O'Hare and Mina Badie) who have been invited only in an attempt to ease tensions over a barking dog dispute that's threatening to turn legal.

Continue reading: The Anniversary Party Review