"It's Kind of a Funny Story" (Metro 07/01/11)

It’s Kind of a Funny Story (12A) 101 mins ***

Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, the writer-directors behind the lauded Half Nelson and Sugar, here venture into mainstream territory with a comedy-drama – adapted from Ned Vizzini’s 2006 novel – that turns a sharp, sensitive and timely eye to the growing concern of teenage depression. Beset by familiar stresses – academic pressure, diminished self-confidence, girl trouble – nervy high schooler Craig (Keir Gilchrist) checks himself into a psychiatric facility after a nocturnal flip-out on the Brooklyn Bridge. A rocky initiation ensues – there’s an especially unsettling midnight-hour encounter with a fellow patient (The Hangover’s Zach Galifianakis) who masquerades as a doctor – but our boy eventually comes to equip himself with a support network, and finds others need his help a good deal more than he does theirs.

It sounds the stuff of earnest young-adult fiction, but it’s a wry kind of funny, and Boden and Fleck display their usual, touching commitment to getting characters who’ve wandered into potentially overwhelming environments back onto something like the right track. Their sure touch with actors remains: likable newcomer Gilchrist is nudged along nicely by Galifianakis, doing unhinged in a more realistic key than Due Date permitted, and by the increasingly noteworthy Emma Roberts, as a self-harmer who offers Craig renewed encouragement. Countless teen movies over the years have served as a pick-me-up – the cinematic equivalent of scoffing a bag of Haribo in one go. Coming as a genuine antidote to the January blues, this is one of the few that might legitimately be described as therapeutic.

It's Kind of a Funny Story opens in selected cinemas from tomorrow.