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'Don't Worry,' this is one of the most honest looks at alcoholism and recovery the movies have seen

It's the story of John Callahan (played by Joaquin Phoenix), an alcoholic-turned-paraplegic by a drunk driving accident. It's also among the most lived-in and honest portraits of alcoholism and recovery ever put on film.

A man speaks up at an AA meeting and launches into a litany of the bad hands life has dealt him, the reasons he drinks. He's having himself a pity party, and soon the other members of the small group start laughing. The man grows enraged. How can you laugh at my pain? What kind of place is this?

The scene is from the new film Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot, opening Friday. It's the story of John Callahan (played by Joaquin Phoenix), an alcoholic-turned-paraplegic by a drunk driving accident. It's also among the most lived-in and honest portraits of alcoholism and recovery ever put on film.

The film nails the common resistance of the AA newcomer, the hesitant steps toward acceptance, and the fact that not drinking is just the beginning of sobriety. It understands that life goes on after you drop the bottle, that alcoholism can be ridiculous as well as tragic, and that even after you stop, you're still left with the self-destructive traits that made you drink alcoholically in the first place.

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In AA those traits are called "character defects." They include chronic fear, envy and resentment. Callahan, who died in 2010 after becoming a successful cartoonist in recovery, knew plenty about character defects; he wrote the book on which the film is based. So does Phoenix, who checked himself into rehab in 2005 and knows his way around recovery language and concepts.

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"I think John realized that there was deeper work he had to do, and that's what frightened him most about being sober," Phoenix says by phone. "Giving up the alcohol, which he's leaned on since he was 12 years old, was obviously very, very frightening. But there was also exposing himself and his character defects, and I think that was the thing that frightened him most." (Among John's character defects: He consciously uses his wheelchair to get sympathy from others.)

John's home group — the meeting he attends most often - is unusual, and not just because it includes characters played by post-punk icon Kim Gordon and German bad boy actor Udo Kier. They gather around Donny (Jonah Hill), who chairs the proceedings with no-nonsense benevolence. There's a lot of what the AA community calls "cross-talk;" you're not supposed to directly address the person sharing during a meeting. Donny's "piglets," as he calls them, do this routinely. "Donny's group seems like a pretty unique kind of group," Phoenix says. "People are challenging each other. It's not a traditional AA meeting."

Despite the quirks, Don't Worry is uncommonly wise about the emotional truths of recovery and especially early sobriety. "It's about relating to other people, having empathy and understanding, getting out of your own head, and realizing everything doesn't revolve around you," Phoenix says. "Also, having a connection to a higher power, and some kind of spirituality." And yes, there is a lot of laughter at meetings, which often baffles and even offends newcomers. "We aren't a glum lot," reads the organization's primary text, Alcoholics Anonymous (commonly referred to as the Big Book). After a while, it's hard to be glum when you've been handed a second chance.

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Other movies have dipped their toes in AA, with varying degrees of commitment and success. We see Jack Lemmon's Joe Clay go to his first meeting in Days of Wine and Roses. In Something to Live For, an AA member played by Ray Milland, who also starred as a hopeless alcoholic in The Lost Weekend, is sent to help an alcoholic actress (Joan Fontaine). That's generally considered an AA no-no; men are supposed to tend to men, women to women, lest romantic entanglements ensue, as they do here.

More recently, films including Flight and Smashed send their alcoholic protagonists to meetings.

But few if any of these films match the time and care that Don't Worry spends on AA, its core concepts and the challenges and rewards of recovery. The film invites us into John Callahan's journey, from soup to nuts, and makes clear his need to keep working on himself after he takes his last drink. There are no saints in Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot. Just human beings trying to get better, one day at a time.