In 2001, Lenny Cooke was the most hyped high school basketball player in the country, ranked above future greats LeBron James, Amar'e Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony. A decade later, Lenny has. Dec 06, 2013 “Lenny Cooke” and the Problem with Best Documentaries. Featured in the movie.) “Lenny Cooke” is, in effect, a nonfiction drama; it’s a documentary film in the literal sense of.
In addition to shaping the material, the Safdies append it with new footage shot in 2012 with an older, somewhat wiser Lenny Cooke. Before the new section kicks in, 'Lenny Cooke' has a refreshing fly-on-the-wall feeling. It doesn't rely on talking heads to drive the narrative. We follow Cooke as his high school star rises, meeting his best friend, his coaches, his mother, and the aforementioned future NBA stars Anthony, Stoudemire and James. We also meet the wealthy woman who takes him into her Old Tappan, New Jersey home so his high school career won't be interrupted.
Lenny Cooke, a once top-ranked high-school basketball player, learns a heartbreaking lesson in 2002 when he decides to skip college and place all his hopes on the NBA draft. Jun 07, 2016 Lenny Cooke follows the story of a former #1 ranked high school basketball player and his challenges and struggles while trying to get into the league. The documentary style film-making makes it very easy to follow and gives a unique perspective. Today he lives in southern Virginia, a should-have-been-great who simply did not quite make it. The first documentary feature from American independent film scene fixtures Josh & Benny Safdie, 'Lenny Cooke' explores the fascinating question of how, exactly, Cooke’s seemingly assured future could go so awry. In 2001, Lenny Cooke was the most hyped high school basketball player in the country, ranked above future greats LeBron James, Amar’e Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony. A decade later, Lenny has never played a minute in the NBA. In this quintessentially American documentary, filmmaking brothers Joshua and Benny Safdie track the unfulfilled destiny of a man for whom superstardom was only just.
Cooke is an impressionable teenager, but this isn't a film about a good kid gone bad. There's a level of introspection to Cooke, who is often seen discussing his options about going to college vs. entering the NBA draft straight out of high school. Cooke and his buddies discuss Kwame Brown, who entered the draft the year before Cooke's eligibility, and consider what they'd do with the salary Brown was offered. Their dreamy ideas are countered by former NBA coach Mike Fratello, who presents a shocking breakdown of just how little a million dollars will get you in the NBA. After taxes, agents, fees, insurance and other necessities, a player was making less money than someone with far less yearly gross.
It would seem that Shopkorn made the wrong decision by following Cooke, but hindsight is 20/20. When Cooke enters the draft in 2002, he was hotter than the younger LeBron James. One of the best scenes in 'Lenny Cooke' details Cooke's big game against James, the outcome of which looked like many last second King James heartbreakers. There's also footage of Cooke squaring off with his fellow draftee Stoudemire. When the draft ended, Stoudemire was on his way to the NBA, and Cooke was never called to the league.
Before YouTube provided endless mixtapes of teenage basketball stars, before LeBron James changed amateur basketball forever to fuel a 24/7 appetite for online updates on hot prospects, Lenny Cooke was basketball's next big thing.
Cooke, a 6-foot-6-inch swingman out of Brooklyn, was the nation's top player, seemingly on the fast track to NBA fame and riches. But he never made it.
See also: A YouTube Legend Battles for His Basketball Future
That disconnect is the subject of Lenny Cooke, a powerful documentary exploring the dark reality of prodigious promise gone unfulfilled.
Seeing a bloated Cooke rationalize his basketball demise is sobering indeed after watching him confidently interact with future NBA stars including James and Carmelo Anthony as a teen. The film is aided tremendously by the fact that directors Ben and Joshua Safdie are able to use prime footage of Cooke as a high schooler that was shot by Adam Shopkorn in the early 2000s for a never-completed documentary about the young star.
That old footage provides a fascinating, surreal and sometimes disturbing window into Cooke's life as a basketball prodigy. We see him treat future NBA stars as peers or younger brothers. (One of his old friends, Joakim Noah of the Chicago Bulls, produced Lenny Cooke.) We see the eye-popping skills that built his reputation. We see the tough neighborhood where he grew up and the white suburban mom with whom he lived in his late teens. But we also see him sullenly brush off coaches' advice and party like an adult while in Las Vegas for a tournament.
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The trove of old content makes the film's final 25 minutes all the more powerful. Cooke throws himself a 30th birthday party, ending the night on the couch drunkenly scooping food into his mouth in front of the TV. He briefly reunites with Noah and other players on the Madison Square Garden floor after a recent New York Knicks game, an encounter that contrasts Cooke's current circumstance with what might have been. And an emotional argument with friends he rarely sees anymore is a painful reminder of how much has changed since they were all cocky teenagers.
Lenny Cooke's one glaring hole is the narrative gap between its subject's promising younger years and current reality. Short clips of him playing in lowly minor leagues speed the timeline along, but the film never digs into what exactly happened during that decade — the why of his cautionary tale. Was he simply overhyped? Did his skills not develop as expected? Or was Cooke handicapped by personal issues?
To hear Cooke tell it late in the film, he just never had a passion for the game. Under-the-table payments and stardom's accompanying fast life, however, meant he couldn't stay away. Whether that's revisionist history on his part or the simple truth, the rest of us will never know. But as an overweight Cooke says of his fans, handlers and enablers: 'They made me this person. That fucked me up.'
That's something to keep in mind next time highlights of basketball's latest underage phenom pop up on YouTube.
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Lenny Cooke is currently in limited release in cities around the United States. Check the film's website for more details on screenings and distribution.
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