This is a sweet, traditional, extremely well-acted biopic, but it falls a hair short of its full potential. Joaquin Phoenix delivers an excellent and heartfelt performance as John Callahan, an alcoholic man adrift in life who discovers his calling as a ribald, socially conscious cartoonist after being paralyzed in a car accident. It is a performance of sharp humor and deeply felt pain, intertwined; he brings a complexity to Callahan which might not be present on the page. Phoenix is matched by Jonah Hill, delivering a colorful and enormously empathetic performance (the best of his career to date) as Callahan's eccentric A. A. sponsor. (Jack Black also shines in the smaller role of another alcoholic, the man driving the car during the aforementioned accident.) As high-caliber as the acting is, and as tasteful as Gus Van Sant's direction is, the screenplay, also by Van Sant, could use more depth. As dramatized here, Callahan's journey (toward sobriety while also learning to live with a disability) feels a shade too sanitized and tidy. So many interesting ideas are introduced, ranging from the sex life of a quadriplegic to the shortcomings of social programs assigned to help those living with a disability, but not delved into as deeply as they could be. And Rooney Mara's character is rather odd; if her role is indeed an accurate representation of Callahan's real girlfriend, then he found an angelic automaton defined by endless generosity and patience and unburdened by any discernible doubts or flaws. Their relationship in the film feels idealized and sorely underdeveloped.

That poster is bad. It just looks like 4 photos put on top of the other, like zwackerm-draft-stylee. The corner of Hill's jpeg is cutting into Phoenix's head. It could have been created on Microsoft Paint by a child.

and true

I'm mentally scarred by it.