The Wackness is a coming of age in New York City, summer of 1994. Luke Shapiro has just recently graduated from high school but he's feeling quite depressed. He was not a popular kid in school, he doesn't have any friends and his parents fight over little things and act like kids. He also wants and feels like he needs to get laid. So what is exactly Shapiro's deal, one may ask? Well, he listens to a lot of rap and sells marijuana all over town even trading it for therapy from a psychologist, Dr. Jeffrey Squires. Squires is a leaving breathing mess; he sees himself as a failure, his wife is on the verge of leaving him and he takes refuge on antidepressants and drugs. But despite being the very opposite of the typical shrink, he does give some good advices to Shapiro and encourages him to try harder, to live life a little, refusing to put him as well on medicine. Shapiro ends up meeting Squires's stepdaughter, Steph who teaches him a few things about love but also becomes the first girl to brake his heart...The title "The Wackness" comes from a line from Steph who says: " I just look at the dopeness. But you, it's like you just look at the wackness, ya know? ". This sentences defines the film; Shapiro is in a bad place, he can't really find joy in anything and therefor, he doesn't have great expectations, he just keeps on living, hoping for something good to happen. The Wackness is a very endearing little film, the plot is simple but true to life. There's a lot of "hip hop slang", I guess you could say, and other small details that really identify the time-line as the 90's but nothing too extreme or over the top. Josh Peck is great as Luke, showing several sides of the character, sometimes he's really cool, but also very insecure and naive and it's hard not to care for Shapiro, Ben Kingsley's performance was quite a surprise. He is funny, energetic, and spot on as the the screwed up shrink. Overall, The Wackness is a story about growing up, experiencing things and most of all, endure the bad things because life has some good stuff as well.
8/10
