Entertainment

Killer Joe

A sleazy and pointless film about sleazy and pointless people, “Killer Joe” reminds us that what Quentin Tarantino does isn’t easy.

A would-be black comedy written by Tracy Letts, based on his play, and directed by 76-year-old William Friedkin, who has done little of note since he made “The French Connection” and “The Exorcist” during the Nixon administration, the movie stars Emile Hirsch as a low-level drug dealer who decides to kill his mom to pay off his superiors. His white-trash family (Thomas Haden Church as his dad, Gina Gershon as his father’s new wife and Juno Temple as his little sister) eagerly agree. The chosen hit man is a soft-spoken but frightening Dallas cop named Killer Joe (an excellent Matthew McConaughey).

The movie bears all the signs of a poorly adapted play; scenes go on way too long, as though to minimize the effort of moving scenery, and characters keep delivering speeches that do nothing to advance the plot. I suppose these trashy losers are supposed to be amusing in their incompetence, but instead they’re shrill and boring, and the endless scenes of various members of the cast getting their faces pulverized seem to add up to nothing but a pathetic attempt by Friedkin to get back on the list of hot directors. McConaughey’s laconic poise is the only bright spot for this dismal, brutal noir.