Welcome back, Kevin Spacey.
The two-time Oscar winner hasn’t had a role worthy of that title in ages, but that changes in a big way with the new indie drama “Shrink.”
The film follows a depressed psychiatrist and the gaggle of emotionally stunted patients driving him to distraction.
What a shame the film surrounding Spacey clings to the already tired “Crash” template with such fidelity.
“Shrink” stars Spacey as Dr. Henry Carter, one of those celebrity docs whose feel-good books sell millions. But when the story opens the good doctor looks like he’s the one needing some couch time.
He chain smokes when he isn’t getting high, and is so miserable he can’t even muster the energy to record the audio book version of his bestselling book, “Happiness Now.”
He’s a fraud, but there’s a good reason for his melancholy state.
But before he can heal himself he has to deal with his burgeoning patient load, which includes a troubled teen (rising star Keke Palmer), an agent grappling with OCD (Dallas Roberts) and an actress on the wrong side of 30 (Saffron Burrows).
Spacey hasn’t been this good, this magnetic on screen since “American Beauty.” He dances between intellectual playfulness and full-on mourning, finding the right shading to buttress every stage along the way.
Director Jonas Pate and screenwriter Thomas Moffett craft a compelling scenario for Dr. Carter, but the film can’t help weaving all these disparate characters together in that “Crash” meets “Babel” vein that only works with pinpoint execution.
Take Dr. Carter’s affable pot dealer, a character which lets the actor show an unexpected side of the doctor’s personality.Why must the two end up in the same hospital room later in the film?
Visually, “Shrink” is a burden to behold. The colors seem as bleary as Dr. Carter’s take on reality, with many early scenes awash in ungainly blue tint.
“Shrink” doesn’t stand up to much scrutiny, but it’s ambitious and chock full of puckish supporting players. One too many, in fact. The subplot involving a struggling screenwriter isn’t remotely convincing, and the thread only gets worse when a new romance enters that equation.
The film does offer one curious laugh. Robin Williams plays one of Dr. Carter’s patients, a sex-obsessed actor looking to save his marriage. A fellow character implores him at one point to stop making bad movies.
Let’s hope Williams takes the double meaning to heart.
“Shrink” is never dull, but the story starts to sag under the weight of all these precious characters and it never fully recovers.
(Photo: Kevin Spacey stars as Dr. Henry Carter in “Shrink,” directed by Jonas Pate/Photo credit: Jihan Abdalla)
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
The constant craming of as many characters into a film as possible shows me, with very few exceptions, a screenwriter who isn’t talented enough to sustain a compeling story with just one or two characters.
Beyond that it could just be lazyness, possibly ego driven actors who all have to have their own “moments” in a film or as was started with CRASH, it signals a message film.
“Crossing Over” was one of the latest, worst examples of this trend, Opus. And I suspect you’re right … it’s a lazy way to ratchet up interest in a story. With “Shrink,” multiple characters should have been dropped …