Shrink

Hollywood loves to hate itself. From ‘Sunset Boulevard’ to ‘Swimming with Sharks’, films which expose the dark heart beneath the glitzy exterior – and paint their moviemaking protagonists as living, breathing, conflicted  human beings – will always win favour with a Tinseltown elite desperate to see their lives reflected on screen. Somewhere inside ‘Shrink’, there’s an intelligent exploration of how the unreality of the movies affects those who make and view them, as filtered through the foggy perceptions of self-medicating psychiatrist-to-the-stars Kevin Spacey and the various filmmakers, fuck-ups and family members he associates with (including Saffron Burrows, Robert Loggia and a wisely uncredited Robin Williams). But any fleeting moments of wit or insight – and there are a few – are drowned out by the monumental self-importance and grinding, humourless predictability of the picture. It doesn’t help that the characters are petty and unlikeable, the score tediously heavy-handed and the supposedly uplifting climactic scenes laughably saccharine and unconvincing.