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Our Picks For: The Incredible ShrinksBen Kingsley has got long hair. He’s smoking pot. Out of a bong. And making out with Mary-Kate Olsen. And he’s a psychiatrist. Gandhi suddenly seems like an awfully long way off. The movie is called The Wackness, and Kingsley plays Dr. Squires, an analyst in early 1990s New York City, who trades psychotherapy sessions for weed from one of his patients (Josh Peck), who just so happens to have a thing for his daughter (Juno’s Olivia Thirlby). The film, just issued in theaters, has received good reviews and seems destined for at least cult status. But it got us thinking of some of the other psychiatrists we’ve seen in the movies over the years. High Anxiety (1977): Mel Brooks’ homage to Hitchcock gets better as the years go on. The former Melvin Kaminsky stars as Dr. Richard Thorndyke, the new head of the Psychoneutoric Institute for the Very, VERY Nervous. Thorndyke, whose crippling fear of heights smacks of Jimmy Stewart's in Vertigo, discovers some evil things afoot in the facility, where he encounters such characters as Nurse Diesel (Cloris Leachman), the bondage-craving Dr. Charles Montague (Harvey Korman) and blonde tootsie Victoria Brisbane (Madeline Kahn). Analyze This (1999) / Analyze That (2002): Shades of The Sopranos! Billy Crystal plays the shrink to Robert De Niro’s confused mob kingpin in these two funny films helmed by Harold Ramis. We like De Niro’s shtick and lines like Crystal’s “What is my goal here—to make you a happy, well-adjusted gangster?” Also, the casts in these farces are filled with such authentic faces as Chazz Palminteri, Joe Viterelli, and Leo Rossi. Anger Management (2002): The dream team of Adam Sandler and Jack Nicholson works well throughout most of this funny farce with Sandler as a genial fellow, haunted by a pantsing in his past, who gets in legal trouble over an overblown air rage incident and is sent to overcranked New Age analyst Jack for direction. But the doc turns out to be as wacky as him. The President’s Analyst (1967): Ultra cool 1960s icon James Coburn is the ultra cool psychiatrist to the Commander in Chief, who finds his world tuned upside down when some government operatives think he knows too much. The villains keep changing as Coburn loses his cool, tries to find solace among the counter-culture, and confronts the Cold War and the phone company. What’s New, Pussycat? (1965): Fashion editor Lothario Peter O’Toole seeks help for his lack of commitment, even though he’s about to marry the hot Romy Schneider. His shrink on the subject is the bewigged Dr. Fassbender, played to full loon by Peter Sellers. The problem is that the not-so-good doctor has his own sexual thing for a patient who has the hots for O’Toole. And he also has a rotund wife who wears a Viking helmet. Penned by Woody Allen, who also takes a supporting role, and featuring the hit title tune by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, WNP? is often inspired 1960s lunacy with one of the goofiest psychiatrists in movie history. And let’s not forget the comely cast that also boasts Capucine, Ursula Andress and Paula Prentiss. What About Bob? (1991): A surprise hit in theaters and a favorite on home video, this farce feature Richard Dreyfuss as a Mahattan psychiatrist and self-help author verging on smug who decides to take some R& R time in New Hampshire and prepare for an appearance on Good Morning, America. Problem is that one of his patients, the extremely neurotic Bill Murray, joins him on vacation and proceeds to annoy him to no end. Julie Hagerty and Kathryn Erbe also star in this effort directed by Frank Oz. Running With Scissors (2007): Augusten Burroughs’ acidly funny take on his own life is turned into a very dark farce centering on Burroughs (Joseph Cross) and his relationship with his wacky family, including wannabe poet, pill-dependent mother Annette Bening, and distant father Alec Baldwin. Augustyn begins seeing a psychiatrist (Brian Cox), whose own family is as wacky as his. Among the members are dog food-eating mother Jill Clayburgh, religious daughter Gwyneth Paltrow, rebellious sister Evan Rachel Wood, and adoptive schizophrenic brother Joseph Fiennes. Mumford (1999): This underrated, little seen gem from Lawrence Kasdan stars Loren Dean as the title character, a young psychiatrist who has picked up quite a roster of clients in a small town named—oddly enough—Mumford. He’s had great success with shopaholic housewife Mary McDonnell, fantasies-obsessed pharmacist Pruitt Taylor Vince, and emotionally distraught teen Zooey Deschanel. Trouble arises when two other analysts in the area (David Paymer, Jane Adams) see their client roster drop and want to find out more about Mumford’s mysterious past. Don Juan De Marco (1995): A spry romantic fantasy made before Johnny Depp had such box-office heat. He’s a young man who believes he is the real Don Juan. He tells of his countless romantic liaisons to psychotherapist Marlon Brando, who, in turn, starts to feel young again, thanks to the therapy sessions. Faye Dunaway, Rachel Ticotin and Talisa Soto also star. The film also featured the Oscar-nominated song Have You Ever Loved A Woman? by Bryan Adams.
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