Review: Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot
Reteaming with director Gus Van Sant 23 years after delivering a sit-up-and-take-notice performance in To Die For, Joaquin Phoenix stars as quadriplegic John Callahan in Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot, a meandering but inspiring biopic on the irreverent cartoonist's struggle with alcoholism.
Based on Callahan's memoir, the film also marks a return to form for the director, whose previous effort, Sea of Trees, was a tremendously botched effort. Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot does have its share of issues, most notably its loose-limbed and often aimless narrative, but it remains a highly compelling watch thanks to Phoenix's lead performance, which deftly navigates Callahan's zigzagging emotional shifts, and stellar supporting turns from Jonah Hill and Jack Black, who play pivotal characters in Callahan's life.
"The last time I walked, I woke up without a hungover. I was still loaded from drinking the night before," Callahan shares with an audience that has come to recognise his work and also separately with his AA group as he begins his recovery. Though he's at two completely different points in his life, this shuffled timeline establishes how Callahan remains essentially the same troublemaking wiseass who still carries the same pain and inner demons with or without alcohol, but who at least has learned to forgive himself thanks to the people who helped along the way.
The first of those people, strangely enough, is Dexter (Jack Black), the self-described "cunnilingus king of Orange County" and fellow boozer with whom he spends the night getting absolutely wasted. On their way across town to another party, Dexter ends up slamming the car into a light pole at 90 miles per hour. He escapes without a scratch, Callahan ends up paralysed. "I don't know how I can have any life after this," Callahan confesses to Annu (an underused Rooney Mara), the Swedish volunteer therapist who will soon become his lover. She's the first to treat him as a human being rather than a specimen to be observed, and she encourages him to recognise what a special person he is and that life is worth living.
Yet Callahan can't shake off the feeling that life has dealt him a terrible hand, and he turns to alcohol again. He soon joins the AA group run by Donnie (Hill), a recovering alcoholic who gently but firmly forces Callahan, who has always blamed his drinking on his mother giving him up for adoption when he was a baby, to take responsibility for his own actions. As a fellow AA member points out, saying "Poor me, poor me" will soon turn into "Pour me another drink." Phoenix and Hill share such a lovely and genuine warmth, especially in their piercing final scene together, that one wishes the film would have lent more focus on the relationship between Callahan and Donnie. It bears repeating how exceptional Hill is as the languid, trust fund gay Christian whose tenderness and wisdom is more valuable than his monetary wealth; look for him come awards time.
The dearly departed Robin Williams had originally wanted to star as Callahan, and certainly his own personal experiences with addiction and recovery would have lent a different depth to the film. Yet one wonders if Williams might have been too outsized for the role, and not completely abandoned his persona and simply disappeared into the part the way Phoenix does. One can't argue with the anguish that Phoenix embodies as Callahan yearns for a bottle of vodka out of his reach or the generosity of spirit as he forgives Black's Dexter. It's raw and real moments like these that sucker punch you out of nowhere and make the film a flawed yet immensely riveting viewing experience.
Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot
Directed by: Gus Van Sant
Written by: Gus Van Sant; based on the memoir by John Callahan
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Jonah Hill, Rooney Mara, Jack Black, Tony Greenhand, Beth Ditto, Mark Webber, Carrie Brownstein, Kim Gordon, Udo Kier, Ronnie Adrian, Mireille Enos
