{"id":3709,"date":"2009-07-30T00:01:03","date_gmt":"2009-07-30T05:01:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.regrettablesincerity.com\/?p=3709"},"modified":"2011-11-09T20:31:00","modified_gmt":"2011-11-10T00:31:00","slug":"shrink","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/?p=3709","title":{"rendered":"Shrink"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"shrink01\"You know what\u2019s awful about shallow people? They\u2019re just so\u2026 shallow.<\/p>\n

Shallow people have nothing to say, but despite that they seem completely self-involved, about what isn\u2019t clear. If you don\u2019t have thoughts, what could you be thinking of?<\/p>\n

What does the stereotypically shallow Hollywood agent consider when he\u2019s yelling and screaming at people and putting together loud, expensive disaster movies that he doesn\u2019t even watch? Is he naturally angry? What about the spiritual and na\u00efve actor that the agent represents, can he find his meaning in prescription drugs? What about that screenwriter who doubles as a waiter, trying his damndest to avoid clich\u00e9s, but that\u2019s all he knows, is he ever going to find that profound idea that he\u2019ll turn into a script that moves people and makes them weep? If he\u2019s just like everyone else, nothing distinctive about him, how will he manage originality? Do you think he\u2019ll find it by following around the \u201colder than her years,\u201d poor, black teenager who can\u2019t stand to look at herself (causing a broken mirror) because she doesn\u2019t know why her mother killed herself? Will her shrink, who, coincidentally, had a wife who also just killed herself, be able to understand her, or will he dote on the gorgeous actress\/patient being ignored by her rock-star husband who likes himself a whole lot? Will the shrink melt down during a TV interview, claiming himself a fraud, while every single character described above has the TV on, turned on to that specific channel, to a book interview show that would be on public access, and was somehow shot live, so the shrink\u2019s ranting and raving wouldn\u2019t be reshot?<\/p>\n

\"shrink2\"What is distinctive about any <\/em>of these people? Well, in Jonas Pate\u2019s Shrink,<\/em> the actor is clearly modeled on Colin Farrell, the agent looks like Jamie Kennedy, the black girl has\u2026 glasses and the shrink smokes a lot of pot (star\/producer Kevin Spacey). Then there\u2019s the screenwriter\u2014who knows the black girl for some reason, but that\u2019s on the cutting room floor. The agent\u2019s secretary is pregnant, the guy interviewing the shrink is played by noted media critic and screenwriter Gore Vidal (who must have thought his scene was a joke). And they are all tied together by the fact they are profoundly uninteresting.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s nothing else to Shrink<\/em>, except for one wholly unbelievable scene after another, including an intervention by Spacey\u2019s family, because he\u2019s smoking too much\u2026 Pot. Though it doesn\u2019t really seem to be affecting him all that much and you certainly never hear of interventions for a drug as mild as pot. Are there interventions held for people who drink too much coffee and we just don\u2019t know about them?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s funny to see a movie so clearly made solely for those who live and work somewhere between the Paramount and the Fox lot, and still seem to have no material on that subject that isn\u2019t obvious or avoids appearing like unintentional parody. Did Spacey really look at the script for Shrink<\/em> written by Thomas Moffett and think, \u201cit\u2019s another edgy, Hurlyburly<\/em> bit of LA cynicism and insight. It even ties up the plot strands in a neat little bow complete with convenient panic attacks and totally unmotivated personality changes that suit the characters, but don\u2019t make much sense.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"spaceysmoking\"In reality, Shrink<\/em> is a lot closer to a Bret Easton Ellis novel, in terms of presenting a bunch of self-centered, drug-addled deluded Los Angelinos, who can only offer nonsense rambling and bogus self-help speeches. The only difference is that the characters in Shrink<\/em> are not intended as mocking and satirical, but rather those who find piercing insight into life in the strangest places, insight that they can\u2019t wait to reveal to us. I feel so privileged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You know what\u2019s awful about shallow people? They\u2019re just so\u2026 shallow. Shallow people have nothing to say, but despite that they seem completely self-involved, about what isn\u2019t clear. If you don\u2019t have thoughts, what could you be thinking of? What does the stereotypically shallow Hollywood agent consider when he\u2019s yelling and screaming at people and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[5188,4952,115,4960,3725,153,3663,1888,4686,4964,4961,4958,786,1746,4949,905,4946,4965,4954,4950,1640,720,3727,2437,3412,4966,4962,4600,1415,4203,222,4963,310,4951,4968,5189,4956,2720,4809,2542,1166,4947,505,4967,4959,4955,2778,4948,4957,4953],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3709\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}