‘Smashed’ Will Break Your Heart
September 16th, 2012 | Posted by in Movies 
Remember all those times in college you were like “Oh my god I can’t wait to get f*cking wasted tonight and black the eff outtttt,” and then those times after college when you said the same thing except it was slightly less acceptable? The Sundance film Smashed looks like it will make you never want to hit the bottle again, and it also might break your heart. Starring Aaron Paul who plays loveable junkie-turned-pro-meth-dealer in Breaking Bad Jesse Pinkman, and Mary Elizabeth Winstead, the movie takes you on a journey through a beautiful marriage marred by substance abuse and adolescent antics.
Mary Elizabeth’s character opens up the trailer by saying “I have to tell you something…last night…I ended up smoking crack.” …And this big reveal, it’s just like this “Hmmph, okay, honey” moment. I need to see a movie that fosters a relationship like that. How did they reach that point together in their marriage, and more importantly, as humans, that crack-smoking is as insignificant as forgetting to take out the trash? I must know!
In Breaking Bad, Aaron Paul’s Jesse Pinkman is a loveable, relatable, yet almost pitiful character who so many, including myself, are attached to; separating him from this work seems like it might be almost jarring–won’t he always be Jesse? And while the elements of drug abuse and emotional and physical pain that run so rampant in Jesse’s character clearly shine through in Paul’s Smashed persona, I’m eager to see how the two will intersect and diverge to create the similarly complex, yet such distinct world of alcohol abuse.
Smashed seems tragic and deep and raw and like something that would make me never want to drink again. It sounds like something that might make me cry, but isn’t that a dead-ringer for a really good movie? When it can make a skeptic feel something? It might be a concept we’ve seen before–addiction, making a change, coming of age–but Smashed might have a certain level of integrity and authenticity that other attempts do not.
Smashed hits theaters October 12.
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