Click here to listen to the interview (17:52)

William Friedkin has made few movies over the last five decades or so, and when I spoke with him on July 11, 2012, he explained his reasons. The man who made THE EXORCIST, THE FRENCH CONNECTION, and SORCERER is not a man to compromise what he wants to achieve in a film. His preferred subject, the examination of how people in extreme conditions react, is one that brooks no compromise in order to be effective. With KILER JOE, the result is a film that is brutal but fascinating, and which, per Friedkin, more than deserves its NC-17 rating.

A man with strong opinions, and an expansive, even avuncular, way with a convesation, he held forth on the undiscovered depths of Matthew McConaughey's talents, why it would be foolish for him to judge the film's characters, and the secret of getting spontaneity on film.