Thursday, August 21, 2008
Despite its title, The Wackness is by far one of the dopest movies I have seen this year.
While it may not have the special effects or hype of many of the blockbuster movies released this summer, it more than makes up with its excellent cast and well-written script. The story centers around recent high school graduate and drug dealer Luke Shapiro, played with an impressive performance by Josh Peck, who is best known for his role on the Nickelodeon show Drake and Josh. It is set in summer of 1994 in New York City where Peck plays an angst-ridden pot dealer who trades weed for therapy sessions with Dr. Jeffery Squires, played admirably by Ben Kingsley. Peck has just graduated high school and has little direction in life other than his love of classic hip-hop, selling drugs throughout the city from an ice cream cart and getting laid. In the midst of lives that seem to be failing to live up to the hopes of those living them, Peck begins pursuing Stephanie, played by Olivia Thirlby, who happens to be the daughter of his therapist, Kingsley.
The movie explores what it means to grow into adulthood, whether you are 18 or 50, what it means to be in love and the nature of friendship between people who are kindred souls despite having very different lives. The humor in this movie, although very dark, allows for several laugh-out-loud moments. It also provides an opportunity to appreciate how the difficulties in life are not insurmountable but are part of the experience and ultimately make you appreciate the beauty that this world has to offer.
The great cast includes Famke Janssen who plays Kingsley’s wife, Method Man who is Peck’s Caribbean drug dealer and Mary Kate Olsen who, in a not very big stretch, plays a trust fund hippie spending her days taking mushrooms in the park and going to charity balls.
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