Touching and funny tale of depression

Silver Linings Playbook (15)
Running time 122 minutes
Rating:****
While veteran director John Ford was probably spot-on when he said that you shouldn’t give actors too much to do as they might think they were important, there is something to be said for giving a director some decent people to work with.
If you are trying to make a film about such a complex subject as mental illness, then handing it over to anyone could lead to something like Anger Management.
But, if you engage the heavyweight talents of Robert De Niro and the very excellent Jennifer Lawrence (Winter’s Bone), then you have a chance of success.
So director David O Russell (Three Kings, The Fighter), must be counting his dramatic blessings with Silver Linings Playbook, a silly title for a film that skates the very narrow line between pathos and the type of merciless humour in television’s An Idiot Abroad.
Adapted from the Matthew Quick novel, it tells the story of Pat (Bradley Cooper, The Hangover, Limitless) who has had a breakdown after splitting with his wife and has spent several months in rehab learning to cope with severe bipolar depression.
The fact that he comes from a troubled family does not help the recovery much as dealing with his obsessive/compulsive father Pat Senior (Robert De Niro) poses challenges on a daily basis.
Also, being obsessed with the pointless exercise of getting his wife back and running around town in a binbag adds to the nervousness of all around him.
However, director Russell cleverly avoids the opposing pitfalls of over-sentimentality and gross ignorance and paints a picture of people struggling with demons they barely acknowledge.
When Pat meets up with Tiffany, a grieving policeman’s widow who expressed her grief by having sex with everyone she works with (lots), then the path seems clear to a mental implosion of megatrauma proportions. Unless of course, the couple take up something which for them can be obsessive and compulsive, such as dancing.
Still, with just a hint of Hollywood, the couple dance their way, if not to sanity, then at least to a half-reasonable way of coping.
It’s an edgy tale, with plenty of tantrums and anger, but fortunately, without too much psychobabble. Cooper and Lawrence are particularly good, with De Niro lurking like an ageing taxi driver in the background, adding weight and some sadness.
It’s not a comfortable film to watch, and I’m sure some medical professionals would have things to say about its central premise of coping through a learning strategy, but understanding mental illnesses have to start somewhere, and this is a better place than most Hollywood films.