The Wackness (R-2008)

"The Wackness" is the story of a very bizarre friendship set in New York City, 1994. Josh Peck (of "Drake and Josh") plays Luke, a high school graduate who deals marijuana and sees therapist Jeffrey Squires (Ben Kingsley), who he pays marijuana in exchange for treatment. Luke is at that crossroads between the "child" in high school and the "young man" in college and is struggling with a deteriorating home situation. He is also falling in love with Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby), Dr. Squires' step-daughter. The appeal of this movie for me was Ben Kingsley, who is great in everything he does, and Josh Peck, who I've been watching so long in "Drake and Josh", I just had to see him in a more adult role. The good news on both of those counts is the performances are extremely good. Kingsley is terrific as the very quirky Dr. Squires, who is a psychotherapist, but is desperately in need of treatment himself as he pops pills, smokes pot and is near suicidal. Josh Peck is also very, very good as the drug dealer who is desperately trying to get his life on some kind of legitimate course while all around him are a mess. However, the movie does have some problems. The biggest is that I was not fond of the way it was lit. It just never looked right and I think it was an attempt to set some kind of mood, but it did not work for me. The movie is also very dialogue-driven. There is some great dialogue and terrific individual scenes, but overall, it moved very slow. At first, I was going to criticize what seemed like a forced attempt to remind you the film was set in 1994: Luke is meeting with his supplier while rap music blares in the background. "What's this?", he says. The supplier responds "Aw, that's Biggie. He gonna change the world, man." It turns out that the actor playing the supplier is Method Man, who is a featured rapper on the track playing, so it was more of a "wink" to the actor and not a shoe-horned time stamp. This is a very strong script with a stellar cast with great performances, but I think many would find it too slow to call great. This one is perfect for the dialogue-driven Independent film set.

Grade: C

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