Don't worry, he won't get far on foot: Gus Van Sant back on his feet

Gus Van Sant returns to his mainstream vein, that of Will Hunting and Harvey Milk, to tell the story of the life of disabled cartoonist John Callahan.

While waiting to find Joaquin Phoenix in Joker 2Arte will offer this evening Don't worry, he won't get far on foot (2018), for the first time in clear. See you at 10:30 p.m., after First yearor on the channel's website for watch it for free in replay. Here is the review of First.

Don't worry, he won't get far on foot, the true story behind the film

Except for his participation in the series When We Rise (on the history of LGBTQ struggles), we left Gus Van Sant in a bad position, under the boos of the wild crowd, at the time of the catastrophic Cannes presentation of Our Memories in 2015. A fiasco. But the chameleon filmmaker has tough skin, and is bouncing back today as if nothing had happened with this beautiful Don't worry, he won't get far on footwhich sees him return to his most feel-good, friendly, mainstream inspiration. Behind the title to sleep outside (“Don't worry, he won't go far on foot.”) hides a true story: that of John Callahan, a cartoonist from Portland, Oregon (the eternal HQ of GVS), a tempestuous guy with a loaded past (abandoned by his mother, an alcoholic since he was 12, who became quadriplegic after a car accident), whose fate is told to us in a warm kaleidoscope, full of warm autumnal colors, an intoxicating whirlwind that makes you want to applaud the screen and hug your neighbor in the row. The film tells the story of Callahan's (Joaquin Phoenix) long battle with addiction, his encounter with a support group led by a charismatic gay guru (Jonah Hill), and even takes on quasi-evangelical overtones when it praises the effectiveness of the “12 steps” of Alcoholics Anonymous and the benefits of forgiveness.

All smiles
It sounds a bit syrupy when you say it like that, but these bursts of goodness are fortunately counterbalanced by Callahan's scathing humor, his sarcastic jokes, his taste for provocation and his sometimes detestable behavior – all-smiles biopics are rarely devoted to such bigots. From what Van Sant shows, Callahan loved nothing more than walking around Portland with his cartoons under his arm, stopping passersby (skaters, cops, old ladies …) to ask them to react to these cartoons, offending them at times, making them laugh at others, seeking to unite the community – a community from which he had long felt rejected – with his impolite jokes and his lovingly drawn sociological observations. The artists at Van Sant (the Salinger-esque played by Sean Connery in Meet ForresterKurt Cobain's clone in Last Days…) were, until now, hermits, recluses. Not Callahan, the thorny satirist who rode around town in his wheelchair, armed with his dark humor and politically incorrect quips. The film was originally supposed to be made in the 1990s, but the fact that it’s coming today, in a world where cartoonists have become human targets, probably gives it an even greater resonance.

Misfits
What Gus Van Sant tells through John Callahan's journey is how counterculture unites energies and saves lives. All the filmmaker needs is a shot of two men kissing on a bench, almost filmed on the fly, to suddenly make a whole underworld of marginals, rebels and outcasts throb in the background of his film. Joaquin Phoenix takes advantage of this to pursue a very personal cinematic quest here, dotted with characters similar to Callahan, lost between God and their demons (the Johnny Cash of Walk the Line) and passing through existence like broken, disjointed puppets (The Master). In the same way that Harvey Milk was a combat work disguised as an Oscar-winning film, Don't worry, he won't get far on foot celebrates misfits and the damned under the reassuring exterior of a pretty, benevolent fable. It is a punk anthem played on a soft-rock arrangement. A counter-cultural manifesto, yes, but one that does not intend to exclude anyone.

Is there a Joaquin Phoenix problem in Hollywood?