LAFF 2008: Day 6
A scene from Robert McGuire’s segment of Fear(s) of the Dark
I very nearly skipped The Wackness last night for the late addition of Winged Creatures with Kate Beckinsale. Something about The Wackness didn’t feel right. More than the mixed reviews out of Sundance, I hated the title and the prospect of another story about a teenager on the precipice of college didn’t do much to interest me. The final near-deal breaker was that the film opens in limited release next week.
I literally walked back and forth between the two theaters trying to make up my mind and had mentally committed to first one and then the other more than once over the course of 15 minutes. The deciding factors were Ben Kingsley and Olivia Thirlby. Because of them, I chose The Wackness and I’m glad I did.
The semi-autobiographical sophomore film from Jonathan Levine (All the Boys Love Mandy Lane), The Wackness is a coming of age comedy/drama about Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck), a pot dealing, rap music listening teenager spending his last summer in New York before college. The year is 1994. Kurt Cobain is dead and Mayor Giuliani is in the middle of his campaign to Disnefy the streets of the city by cleaning up the trash, hookers and homeless. Luke has the typical teen problems, he’s not popular kid, he’s never had sex and there is trouble at home. In exchange for pot, he receives therapy from psychiatrist Dr. Squires (Ben Kingsley), a burned out ’60s holdover with plenty of personal problems of his own. Completing the picture, Luke has a crush on Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby), his classmate and Dr. Squires’ stepdaughter.
Outside of the psychiatry for pot angle, it’s not an especially original set up, but Levine brings a great personal touch to the film. He clearly feels his subject matter and it lends the picture an air of believability even at its most unlikely. Josh Peck has the slack-jawed, droopy-shouldered stoner persona down pretty well, but more importantly he’s able to let Luke’s essential innocence come through and it goes a long way toward making him a character you can root for. Ben Kingsley’s performance is what truly elevates the film above the ordinary and makes it worth seeing. He’s having a great time and it shows. Olivia Thirlby (Juno, Snow Angels) continues to show why she has quickly become an LiC favorite,turning in yet another winning supporting performance. Would someone please give this girl her own movie?
Sony Pictures Classics probably had Juno in mind when they snapped this one up out of Sundance. Though it’s about teens, The Wackness is no Juno. It’s less ambitious than the Diablo Cody film, but it’s also less quirky, more likeable and more real. It tries a little too hard at times to be taken seriously, coming off a bit too earnest for its own good, but it’s very likeable and frequently very funny. “Remarkably self-assured” is one of my least favorite film review clichés so I’m not going to use it to describe this film…even though I’m thinking it. (Summer Previews)
Closing out the evening was the animated French omnibus film Fear(s) of the Dark. Created in black and white by 6 renowned comic artists and graphic designers, it’s an uneven mix of creepy short films. Charles Burns delivers a great mix of body horror and relationship horror combined with a kind of awkward coming of age tale in his own trademark style. Best of all though is Robert McGuire’s difficult-to-describe concluding piece, a sort of creepy haunted house in the middle of nowhere number where the terrors lurking in the omnipresent shadows could be real or imagined. The only problem with it is that it’s so amazing looking, you’re too busy gawking to be scared.
Omnibus type films are always hit and miss. The recent Paris je t’aime is a rare example where the individual films actually build upon one another, even if not all of them work perfectly on their own. Fear(s) of the Dark takes an interesting tack: Instead of simply jumping from one short to the next, two of the shorts are spread out between the other four. As an attempt at integrating the films, it doesn’t work, but it’s a nice way of breaking the films up and keeping things moving along. In the end, though Fear(s) of the Dark doesn’t quite work as a whole, the good segments vastly outweigh the less interesting ones and it’s definitely worth checking out, especially for animation fans. (International Showcase)
Tonight, American Teen is screening, but it’s an outdoor show at the Ford Amphitheater which is far enough removed from the other venues that it would be the only movie I could catch for the evening. I’m going to skip it and hope for a screening in the near future because I’d miss my only chance to see Ballast, a film that got some great reviews out of Sundance and I’ve been looking forward to seeing it.
Filed under: Film Festivals
Related Posts: - 700 Miles from Sundance: Weekend Update
- Sundance Announces Awards
- Weekend Forecast: July 4th
- LAFF 2008: Day 10 - Part 2
- Weekend Forecast: 5/18/07
Craig, that was a marvelous and perceptive review there you wrote for THE WACKNESS, and I am glad it work out for you after that 15 minute indecision. Indeed, those performers would be decision-breakers for anybody. Looks like this one will make it’s mark when it opens nationally, your commentary is most appealing.
Similarly the French one looks more of an experimental nature and it is sure to have some hits and misses as you relate.
BALLAST does look like a big winner, I look forward to what you say here.
AMERICAN TEEN looks interesting too, but that situation is untenable.
I agree with you on Peur(s) du Noir. Like you, I liked both the opening and closing sequence. Of the linking ones I liked the abstract one, but the one with the dogs wasn’t my thing. Nor was the one with the chinese girl, actually. Which makes five, in total, meaning I’ve totally blacked out on one of the segments…oh well. I DID see it back in January, after all. Or should I lower my alcohol intake? ;-)
The one you’ve forgotten was the one about the crocodile and the missing people. I may have kind of dozed during that one.
I have to say, none of the segments were bad and at 78 minutes there isn’t much chance to get bored.
The top posting (at this moment) on Awards Daily–by Sasha Stone—is toasting Craig for his LAFF coverage, and some fine points are made on the position Craig explained about not taking reviews of these festivals too seriously.
Sasha’s piece on Craig is worth checking out.
I’m always thrilled to get a link from the esteemed Ms. Stone, Sam. Thanks for the heads up. I owe a lot of what LiC is to her in more ways than one.
this may surprise you…but i’m gonna see the wackness. have to wait till july 18th or so….
Tough call between Ballast and American Teen. The first is definitely one of my top picks coming out of Sundance. I’m nervous for your thoughts on it. Had both been playing at MSPIFF I would have also picked Ballast. For what it’s worth, I don’t think American Teen would work well outside, either.
The Wackness. I’m in two minds about it. I loved everybody but Method Man and Mary Kate Olsen, and I more than appreciated the soundtrack, but I thought Levine’s incessant 90’s referencing was a major and blaring distraction. How many times did he need to set the tone here? It takes place 15 years ago and I felt like he was treating it like a period piece. THIS is what people wore and THIS is how they talked and THIS is what was in the news and so on and so on. Even if our memories were that bad, I still felt like it was too much. The year was important in a marginal way, but it’s not like the whole story depends on it - at all.
Anyway, it’s one of my only criticisms. I’ll post my actual review before it opens here in mid-July. I’m not surprised it won the Sundance Audience Award and I think it will end up doing big bucks (hope so - it’s my last box office league sleeper), but I don’t expect it to be talked about at the end of the year. I’d be surprised - what you do think?
And regarding Juno, it didn’t help that they both feature the song “All the Young Dudes,” did it?
Lastly, I got a free Wackness t-shirt at the screening I went to. I think I wore it to the gym once, but I would otherwise feel awkward about it. Do people wear promotional t-shirts just walking around in public?
“The Wackness is no Juno.”
High praise indeed!
I posted the trailer for The Wackness at AD on May 7th, and got exactly zero comments. The first trailer was a fairly inscrutable bit of editing though, and for some reason focused on the therapy (let the summer fun times begin!) There’s a better trailer now that gives more of a clue that it’s sweet and sexy. The first attempt was so bad that /Film featured it as an example of how Sony Pictures Classics seems to specialize in badly bungling the marketing of the little gems they buy at Sundance.
The Wackness got an excellent reception at Tribeca, I think, and I’ve been keeping an eye out for a review I could trust. (Let me know if you guys see one.) (Kidding! ;-)
Great coverage, as always Craig. I’ve heard from a friend who’s just beginning to tune in to smaller offbeat films that your LAFF reviews are opening a whole new world of movie possibilities that he never knew existed. You’re the Ambassador of Freshness.
Another stellar piece of coverage, Craig. I’m looking forward to seeing The Wackness, as I believe Ryan’s right that it first received a strong reception at Tribeca, and at Sundance… I have heard about Daniel’s complaint, about it dating itself so thoroughly as an early ’90s “period piece” that it’s distracting. Nevertheless, it sounds fairly interesting. Kudos to Sasha Stone for rightly talking your reporting of the LAFF up, it’s been a blast to take it in from here.
“You’re the Ambassador of Freshness.”
I sense a steel cage death match between Craig and his nemesis, Snuggles the fabric softener bear, over that title. Don’t worry though, Craig: that bear is all show, no heart. You can take him.
Snuggles’ manager will bellow early in the fight between rounds to the flamboyant but overconfident bear, “Craig doesn’t know it’s a damn show! He thinks it’s a damn fight!”
Snuggles is a lover, not a fighter. However, best not to fuck with him during the Vernal Equinox.
HA!
Looks like Snuggles suffers from dissociative identity disorder!
Something just snapped when Snuggles saw the steamy boiled-bunny scene in Fatal Attraction. Guess we should’ve recognized the warning signs when he hung the poster of the Rabbit of Caerbannog over his bed.
All the Snuggles p0rn on Youtube is disturbing.
teddy porn, eww.
ahahahah….snuggles