There is an inherent problem with all tragic biopics.  Since the subject matter is based on actual events, most people already know the outcome of the film even before they step up to the box office window.  From the moment the pictures starts, viewers are left holding their breath, waiting for the inevitable final reel, where the catastrophic tragedy and appalling heartbreak finally rear their ugly heads.  Sometimes a film is so good that you get too wrapped up in it to remember that you already know the ending.

Boys Don’t Cry is one of those films.  Cry is based on the true story of Teena Brandon, the young woman that posed as a man, only to be brutally raped and murdered once her secret was “discovered” by two men in rural Nebraska.  The film is an auspicious directorial debut by Kimberly Peirce, who also wrote the script with debut screenwriter Andy Bienen.  Although most of the critical praise for Cry has been focused on the two female leads, I found Peirce’s direction to be more startling than both combined.

Cry begins with twenty-year-old Teena (Hilary Swank, Beverly Hills, 90210) living with her gay cousin Lonny (Matt McGrath, The Impostors).  Teena is totally out of control, already having been convicted of numerous felonies in Lincoln, Nebraska.  She is also trying to save money for a sex change but, in the meantime, does her best at acting like a man by taping down her breasts, jamming a tube sock down her blue jeans, cutting off her hair and, thanks to a unique directory-style name, answers to Brandon Teena.

Through a chance encounter at a bar, Teena befriends a group of close-knit rednecks from Fall City, a tiny, desolate town full of inbred, white-trash, alcoholic, chain-smoking, cow-tipping hicks with no ambition in life.  Needless to say, Fall City is probably the third worst place in the world to try and pull off something like a sexual identity switcheroo (behind the Republican National Convention and the anywhere in the state of Ohio).  She is initially accepted by the group of hillbillies, and Teena begins to fall in love with a girl named Lana (Chloë Sevigny, The Last Days of Disco).  As their romance blossoms, Teena’s secrets begin to unravel as quickly as the gauze that holds down her boobs.

While Swank is fantastic in the lead role (she’s already won just about every critical prize this year), I fail to understand the acclaim given to Sevigny.  Her performance is very one-note, but I guess if you’re a girl pretending to enjoy being eaten out by a girl pretending to be a guy, you should expect heaps of critical praise.  I’m not too sure that Swank’s accomplishments would have been as highly praised if it weren’t for a particularly bad crop of roles for lead actresses in 1999.  But, short of playing a retard that dies, this is the kind of role made to take home a trophy on Oscar night.  She is almost too pretty to pull off playing Teena.  If I see a skinny, deer-like guy with high cheekbones like Swank, I know something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

As good as Swank is, the work behind the camera is even better.  The use of light in Cry is amazing, as is the sections where the film is either out of focus, or sped up for dramatic effect.  Cutting-edge indie cinematographer Jim Denault, who has worked on three Michael Almereyda films as well as Hal Hartley’s wickedly cool The Book of Life, provides brilliant photography throughout the film.  But Cry is poorly paced – it starts very slow and peaks too early.  Maybe the tempo is meant to reflect Teena’s life.

1:54 - for violence including an intense brutal rape scene, nudity, adult language and drug use