The Paperboy (2012)

Directed by Lee Daniels. Starring Zac Efron, Nicole Kidman, Matthew McConaughey, David Oyelowo, Macy Gray, John Cusack, Scott Glenn, Ned Bellamy, Nealla Gordon. [R]

Lurid, overheated trash actually seems to take itself seriously(!), hardly makes a lick of sense, and wastes a go-for-broke performance from Kidman as a tawdry, hot-to-trot Alabama gal in love with a death row inmate (Cusack) she’s never met. Convinced of said inmate’s innocence, McConaughey’s reporter has come back to the Florida backwater he once called home to investigate, but his idealistic efforts take backseat to little brother Efron’s “misadventures” in young lust, racism, and revenge. Lee Daniels’ stunningly misconceived direction can’t rein in his cast, all of whom appear to be operating on their own wavelength, ranging from charisma vacuum (Efron) to slobbering caricature of hate (Cusack), and he trades in on humid Southern Gothic clichés instead of having the guts to say something fresh or profound about these swamp-sticky situations. Full of absurd scenes and absurd dialogue, often overlapping (“If anyone’s gonna piss on him, it’s gonna be me!”), and takes shock value to lethal extremes in the closing chapters, but by then, I was numb to anything that could or would happen. Adapted for the screen from the same-named novel by Daniels and author Pete Dexter.

29/100