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The Wackness
By Joey
Magidson
Great acting abounds
in the indie film, The Wackness...
Nostalgic for the summer of 1994 in New York City? The days of beepers,
boom boxes, and a new mayor named Giuliani. This is the setting for a
great new film called The Wackness, which has been called
this year’s Indie hit since its premiere at Sundance. While it’s far
more edgy than Juno or even Little Miss Sunshine, it
retains the heart that those two films had, and more importantly, is
just about as entertaining.
We spend the summer with Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck, definitely moving into
more adult material here), a high school graduate who pays the bills by
selling pot out of an Italian ice cart. His best customer and only
friend seems to be Dr. Jeffrey Squires (Ben Kingsley, far better here
than he has been of late), a shrink that he exchanges his product with
for, well, his product. Squires suggests to Luke that he can get over
his depression by getting laid, and Luke attempts to follow his advice.
The girl he picks however, is Squires’ step-daughter Stephanie (Olivia
Thirlby, lovely here, and on the verge of really breaking out). Squires
warns him about her, but Luke persists. Over the course of the summer,
Luke bonds with Jeff and Stephanie, sees the damage that families can
do, and learns to focus (as Stephanie says) on “the dopeness in
everything, instead of the wackiness.”
The movie, written and directed by Jonathan Levine, is memorable due to
invoking not so much the feeling of 90’s New York City, but the feeling
of being a teenager that isn’t sure if he’s the most popular of the
unpopular or the least popular of the popular. He’s a kid that is going
to his safety school in the fall (something I associated with a great
deal), has met the first girl he cares about, and just is really
influenced by the time he lives in. Josh loves rap and has adapted
urban slang. While much of the lingo is played for laughs, it also
works to let us see how he looks for something to commit himself to. I
recognized people I knew in Josh, Stephanie, even in Mary-Kate Olsen’s
hippie character (she’s actually quite good here in a small role).
The acting front here is very strong. Josh Peck plays the character
exactly as the character would be in real life. Thirlby is playing a
far different character from the one she played in Juno (though
ironically there is a parallel to Juno in this. A key scene also makes
use of the Mott the Hoople song “All the Young Dudes”, just like in
Juno.). Kingsley goes over the top sometimes, but his character gets to
have the most fun. Able support in the film comes from Olsen, Method
Man’s supplier of Josh’s pot, Famke Janssen ( as Stephanie’s mom and
Jeff’s bored wife), and Jane Adams as a kind hearted customer of Josh’s.
The Wackness is a dramedy at heart about growing up, but it
does it in a very unique way. Despite the immense amount of drugs, this
is a film about happiness and innocence. The Wackness is a crowd
pleaser that features strong acting, a fun story, a soundtrack that uses
mix tapes, and is just overall an experience that is far from, well…wack.
***/****
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