Select language, opens an overlay

Comment

May 12, 2009Michael rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
Here's a quirky little Indie film that caught me totally unaware that I'd come away liking it for it's quiet rage against society at the time. That's 90's New York City society - pre-9/11, in fact - a year after tough-guy new Republican Mayor Rudy Giuliani had come to power with his no-nonsense approach to ridding his famous city of crime, graffiti, and other socially deviant behaviour that was running rampant on the streets of the Big Apple. So, when so many scenes have our two protagonists, Dr. Squires played by Ben Kingsley, and Luke Shapiro played by Josh Peck, either vandalizing public property with a black ink pen, smoking or selling dope in parks or city streets, you have to give them guarded props for "the wackness" in their insistence on remaining unconventional - even while you know this is no way for these two characters to be behaving... not when Squires is a psychiatrist, someone whose principal role in society is to help people deal with their deviant behaviour - not exacerbate it - and the adolescent Luke is seeking the shrink's help for the very anti-social behaviour that seems to consume them both. Props to Director/Screen-writer Jonathan Levine for crossing the generation-gap so effectively in the two main characters, through not only the dialogue he wrote for them but also the comedic angst-filled touches and blissful romantic moments that come out of no where to leave you in your tracks, at the matter-of-factness of their delivery. Then there's the enigmatic women characters he's given us... some like former 007 femme fatale Famke Jannsen, and new-comer Olivia Thirlby who in this film is nothing like the second-fiddle character she played in "Juno". These two manage to remain sexy and desirable even while they pine away the moments spent with our two male protagonists, who seem always staring at their navels or another part of their anatomy as the answer to their problems. All-in-all, I wanted to not like this sordid little ditty given its weary content... but the delivery of such unusual comic drama, just when you don't expect it (try Sir Ben K. in a steamy phone booth scene with Mary-Kay Olsen!) and clever dialogue: Stephanie: "You're a virgin?", Luke: "No. Naw. I just haven't officially had sex yet."; and witty one-liners: Dr. Squires: "Sometimes it's right to do the wrong thing, and right now is one of those times" - all added up leaving me feeling like the movie's ultimate upbeat premise - which I suspect was: Whether you're just coming of age - or suffering from late-adolescence - life is always worth living despite the hardships! Dr. Squires managed to role it off his tongue, even better, during one of his stoned stupors: "Embrace your pain, make it a part of you. You can't do this, you can't just give up. Life is hard and it's full of pain and what-not, but we take it cause there's great stuff too. And we can do it cause we have friends - because we have each other."