OCTOBER 13 2018 LISTENER 57
DON’T WORRY, HE WON’T GET FAR ON FOOT
directed by Gus Van SantM
isfits, dolts, dropouts, hustlers,
loners and outsiders: these are
the raw materials of film-maker
Gus Van Sant. His catalogue –
from My Own Private Idaho and Elephant,
to Drugstore Cowboy – is strewn with them.
Often they’re left to wallow in misery and
become studies in hopeless despair. But,
every now and then, he lets them dust
themselves off and start again.
That was the case in Good Will Hunting,
Van Sant’s most forgiving and beloved
work, and it’s true of this biopic of John
Callahan, a famously dry-witted cartoonist
from Portland who spent most of his life
as a quadriplegic and big drinker.
This whimsical, oddball film follows
Callahan (Joaquin Phoenix) through
the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.
It flashes back to his pickled days
and explores his addiction, but themomentum is progressively optimistic
and positive.
Along the recovery route, he picks up
new friends: Swedish nurse Annu (Rooney
Mara), who is so ethereal you expect her
to be a fictional invention, and campy
AA sponsor Donnie. He’s played by Jonah
Hill, once a staple of schlocky American
pot-comedy, now a frequent upstager of
leading men. Hill’s flamboyant perfor-
mance is one of the best parts of the film.
Van Sant seems to relish Callahan’s
mordant sense of humour, and much
of Don’t Worry shares his surreal irrever-
ence. Some of his cartoons are animated
into the action, including one showing
a blob of bacteria morphing into a goofy
amphibian, then a dinosaur, a Neander-
thal and, finally, a man in a suit standing
before a microphone saying, “I’d like to
thank all those who made it possible for
me to be here tonight.”
And then we actually get that line as
Callahan appears triumphant before a
cheering crowd, marking the film’s decline
into squishy sentiment. “You’re doing
an extraordinary thing,” Callahan is told
by a supporter. Well, that may be so, and
tales of resilience like this ought to be full
of praise for their subjects, but Callahan
always poked fun at his own condition
and expected no special treatment. I sus-
pect he would have got to the end of this
biopic and scoffed at its earnestness.
IN CINEMAS NOW
James RobinsPouring it
on thick
A whimsical biopic
of cartoonist John
Callahan is weighed
down with sentiment.
Films are rated out of 5:
(abysmal) to (amazing)BEAST
directed by Michael PearceB
east is an unusual mystery thriller on
many counts, not the least its loca-
tion. It’s set on the Channel island
of Jersey, which debut feature director
and native Michael Pearce shoots like
he’s letting us in on a secret. It certainly
looks stranger, wilder, sexier and love-
lier than it ever did on Bergerac. Pearce’s
self-penned film – based very loosely on a
historical local criminal case – is no police
procedural.
Yes, it is set alongside an investigation
into why young local women keep turning
up dead in shallow graves. But it’s more
a riveting psychodrama with a touch of
the Brontës about it. The red-haired Moll
(Jessie Buckley) is the shy twenty-some-
thing Cinderella of her family, dominated
by her smothering mother and older
siblings. One drunken night out, she is
rescued by poacher Pascal (Johnny Flynn),
and finds herself drawn to the enigmatic
outsider whose past eventually makes him
a suspect in the killings.
Moll has her own troubled history but
her frowned-upon, passionate relationship
with Pascal finally allows her to grow a
spine and let some latent tendencies resur-
face, both of which make for some hard
left-turns on the road to its startling finale.
It’s not without missteps, such as excess
use of jolting dream sequences and its sup-
porting characters, including a cop who
has a thing for Moll.
Otherwise, this feels like a refreshingly
original plunge into psychological thriller
territory. And in Buckley’s spellbinding,
fearless performance, Beast really roars.IN CINEMAS NOW
Russell BaillieLeaving its mark
A psychodrama
with a touch of the
Brontës makes for an
imaginative thriller.
Surreal irreverence: Jack Black as Dexter and
Joaquin Phoenix as John Callahan.