Guest Director William Friedkin presents Killer Joe

An iconoclastic filmmaker with a fiercely independent spirit, William Friedkin has bravely forged his own path through the past forty years of American cinema. Hollywood is still reeling from Friedkin’s one-two punch of The French Connection and The Exorcist, two films that heralded a new era of filmmaking. Raw and visceral, with an authenticity that cannot be denied, his films—including The Boys in The Band, Sorcerer, To Live and Die in L.A., Cruising, and his latest, Killer Joe—are bold, exciting works that have frequently courted controversy, only to go on to become contemporary classics. A filmmaker who has never stopped challenging himself or his audiences, William Friedkin is the perfect choice to be this year’s Los Angeles Film Festival Guest Director. 

In Killer Joe, a twisted dark comedy based on Tracy Letts’s play, Friedkin serves up a heaping murder story that only a Texas-sized plate can hold. Matthew McConaughey shines as Joe Cooper, a dirty cop hired to take out the hated matriarch of a trailer park family by her own son, who wants to cash in on her $50,000 life insurance policy. The son, Chris, gives up his sweet and innocent sister, Dottie, to Joe as collateral until they get the cash—and Joe can’t resist this young object of desire. Killer Joe is an audacious, sexy thriller that will make you gasp while wanting to bite down on some deep-fried cookin’.

Bing Theater |  $13 general admission, $11 to LACMA members | A conversation with William Friedkin precedes the screening | Tickets: 323-857-6010 or purchase online.