The role of music in Jonathan Levine’s ‘The Wackness’
June 23, 2008 by alex
Here’s a great interview with my buddy Jon, whose movie, The Wackness, comes out on July 3rd. It’s looking like Karen and I are going to the premiere + after party this Wednesday so we’ll be sure to post a quick review (as well as blog the crap out of the rest of the evening!).
The soundtrack is a veritable who’s who of hip hop deep cuts from 1994. Check out this interview that highlights how music came to play such an important role in the flick:
Talk a little bit about why that era was so important to you, in particular 1994.
For me it was two-fold. First off, I saw a great deal of authenticity in the story. If I were to try to write kids today, it would have come off as disingenuous. In order to get the authenticity that I value so much, I needed to go back to 1994. That was the year I graduated high school.
Beyond that, I think there’s a rich tradition of movies that focus on the high school years of a decade or two decades ago. We wanted to follow in that tradition and have people feel the same nostalgia for that time that I was feeling when I was writing it … When you can be one of the first people to look back at a time — remember this music and remember what people were wearing -– you just get this rich wellspring of goodwill. People like to remember these times.
Check out the whole interview here
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