Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck's It's Kind Of A Funny Story has an image problem. Put Zach Galifianakis in a movie set in a mental institution and give it a title like that and, well, people are going to expect a laugh riot. But Boden and Fleck's movie doesn't deliver that at all. And it's not that they tried to make The Hangover 2 and missed, either -- I have no doubt that the directors of Half Nelson have delivered exactly the film that they wanted to -- it's just that it's probably not what you expect it to be.

Keir Gilchrist stars as Craig, a sixteen year old kid who is probably too smart for his own good, and whose world is crumbling around him. It's not, really, but at his age, he lacks the perspective to understand that not getting into the school that dad wants you to, or not getting the girl you lust after, isn't really the end of the world. As a result, Craig is finally cracking under the layers of pressure that he has heaped on himself. He dreams of his own death, of throwing himself off a bridge. But, luckily, he has enough sense to check himself in to a psychiatric hospital instead.

Once there, Craig discovers that the youth ward is under renovations, meaning he has to stay with the adults for the duration of his stay. A minimum of five days with a collection of the mentally disturbed -- aging schizophrenics, a roommate who never leaves his bed, an outspoken prankster prone to roaming the halls dressed as a doctor (that'd be Galifianakis) and the lovely Noelle, a teenage girl prone to self mutilation. Over the next five days Craig will get to know his motley neighbours and, in the process, himself.

First things first: It's Kind of a Funny Story is NOT A COMEDY. It stars one of the most popular comic actors on the planet right now, the trailers have pitched the goofier bits pretty heavily and there are some funny moments scattered throughout but this is not a film primarily intended to make you laugh. You will, from time to time, but really this is a bittersweet remembrance of the confusions and pressures of youth. It's a coming of age story for the broken and the bruised. And it's a demonstration that Zach Galifianakis is more than just a bearded bundle of tics and tricks. The man is asked to deliver an actual performance here and, damn, he actually pulls it off.

Boden and Fleck resolutely resist the urge to use the illnesses and troubles of their characters as punchlines. Though the treatment of mental illness is still quite surface level -- there are simply too many characters here to go into any great depth with any of them -- there's a respect for the material and the underlying issues that fills the entire piece. Gilchrist is a touch bland as Craig -- there's no Ryan Gosling-type breakthrough performance like what the directors had in Half Nelson -- but not distractingly so. Well constructed and well performed, that blandness is perhaps the film's only real weakness, with Gilchrist's personality spreading through the entire thing. There's never quite enough edge to him, never any real belief that he might actually follow through on his suicidal urges, and therefore very little urgency to the film. The same goes for the rest of the patients. With the exception of one outburst from Galifianakis, everything is just a touch tame and sanitary.

After Half Nelson the expectations on Fleck and Boden to match that level have been consistently unmet. They've never quite gotten there again. That's not to say that It's Kind Of A Funny Story isn't a good film, because it is. It's quite good. But with a little bit more boldness it probably could have been a great one. That said, if nothing else it is certainly going to broaden the horizon for Galifianakis and that's certainly a good thing.