Movies

‘Gatsby’ meets ‘Gossip Girl’ in teen drama ‘Affluenza’

“Gatsby” meets “Gossip Girl” in this outsider-among-the-wealthy story set, like Fitzgerald’s novel, on Long Island. But “Affluenza,” from director Kevin Asch (“Holy Rollers”), takes place during the lead-up to the crash of 2008, its focus a group of teenagers in the summer before senior year.

Aspiring photographer Fisher (Ben Rosenfield) finds himself staying with his financier uncle (Steve Guttenberg) and aunt (Samantha Mathis) following the death of his grandfather. His cousin Kate (Nicola Peltz) is a snobby materialist who’s dating a heel named Todd (Grant Gustin), but is coveted by Dylan (Gregg Sulkin), the richest kid in town.

There’s an awful lot of Dan Humphrey about Fisher, a curly-haired middle-class kid who compulsively documents the gilded lifestyle around him; but unlike that “Gossip Girl” character, or Nick Caraway, we never get the sense he’s really ever affected by the proximity.

As the economy implodes and the 1-percenter teens glimpse the end of an era, we never care too deeply about any of them — not even our protagonist, who spends most of the film cocooned in a haze of pot smoke.