The Wackness – Verrückt sein ist relativ (2008)

The Wackness – Verrückt sein ist relativ: Directed by Jonathan Levine. With Ben Kingsley, Josh Peck, Famke Janssen, Olivia Thirlby. It’s the summer of 1994, and the streets of New York are pulsing with hip-hop. Set against this backdrop, a lonely teenager named Luke Shapiro spends his last summer before university selling marijuana throughout New York City, trading it with his unorthodox psychotherapist for treatment, while having a crush on his stepdaughter.

“The Wackness is a coming of age in New York City, summer of 1994. Luke Shapiro has just recently graduated from high school but heu0026#39;s feeling quite depressed. He was not a popular kid in school, he doesnu0026#39;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 Shapirou0026#39;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 Squiresu0026#39;s stepdaughter, Steph who teaches him a few things about love but also becomes the first girl to brake his heart…The title u0026quot;The Wacknessu0026quot; comes from a line from Steph who says: u0026quot; I just look at the dopeness. But you, itu0026#39;s like you just look at the wackness, ya know? u0026quot;. This sentences defines the film; Shapiro is in a bad place, he canu0026#39;t really find joy in anything and therefor, he doesnu0026#39;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. Thereu0026#39;s a lot of u0026quot;hip hop slangu0026quot;, I guess you could say, and other small details that really identify the time-line as the 90u0026#39;s but nothing too extreme or over the top. Josh Peck is great as Luke, showing several sides of the character, sometimes heu0026#39;s really cool, but also very insecure and naive and itu0026#39;s hard not to care for Shapiro, Ben Kingsleyu0026#39;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.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003e8/10”