An eerily haunting welcome scene, eventually corroborated with everything relevant to Dallas(read “the Southern States of the USA”) like Bullfights, cowboy hats, scantily clad girls and Gaucho boots provided the perfect setting for a movie based on the real life Texas Cowboy Ron Woodrof from the 80s. And Matthew McConaughey’s role as Ron actually turned out to be the perfect selection for the same for he had the right physical attributes and the “I often run out of the number of effs I give” attitude required to carry forward in the movie as an HIV positive person who still managed to survive for a period way longer than the time stipulated by his profit mongering doctor who, crippled by his limited vision pertaining to commercial gains from medical prescriptions, forebode the number of days left ahead for the patient to a meager 30.
Of course Ron chose to do otherwise and the way he presented himself in the movie as a person of high spirits who decided to go against the tide and not give up his life to medical tests and appeasing the FDA by adhering to its ‘not for life but for profit’ motives, with the perfect blend of emotions reflected in every scene, wearing a skeletal figure barely managing to keep himself standing straight among the relatively healthier humans in the scenes, I feel that the OSCAR went definitely to the right person. His acting acumen was perfectly visible in every frame and the OSCAR being an award that judges not the best but the best among the best, not undermining the efforts of Leonardo DeCaprio and the rest of the contenders, it had to to be presented to a single Male Actor and it was.
On Similar lines, Jared Leto’s role as the HIV affected transgender Rayon definitely suited him and I can imagine no actor being able to carry out this daunting task on screen with so much reality drooling from his(her) face and eyes every now and then. Not that I am a homophobic but his acting actually made me feel for the first time for this whole group of humans who are pushed to the boundaries of existence by the so called normal people and hence, making them vulnerable to secret and dangerous indulgences leading to deadly diseases like HIV. He definitely deserved the Best Male Supporting Actor award and as there prevails righteousness among the jury, I believe that the 86th Academy Awards was a total success.
Moreover, the constant need of propagating the message to the audience that even the worst of diseases cannot deter a determined Soul was the strongest aspect of their acts.