From darkness into light

Donnie Darko

Director: Richard Kelly

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Drew Barrymore, Patrick Swayze, Katharine Ross

Cert: Club.

First time director Kelly - he also wrote the screenplay - brings us an off-beat gem of a movie.

He has captured to perfection the complexity of his central character, a teenager living in deadly suburbia and facing no clear-cut future.

Donnie lives in a world of hopelessness, yet Kelly gives his story a rich mixture of human observation, understanding and humour and a mixture of several other films.

Life in the burbs is pretty bleak, though a lot does happen to our hero, played with some style by Gyllenhaal in a film that is never quite what you expect it to be.

If you expect it to be a knock-out, though, you won't be disappointed.

Star Rating: 4/5.