Goes for gold

Rating: Null/10 (9 March 2015)

SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK is basically DIRTY DANCING with mentally ill people. Two lost souls - Bradley Cooper just out of the nut house after having been diagnosed as bipolar following his wife's affair, Jennifer Lawrence an ex- slut still broken up by her cop-husband's death in a traffic accident - find each other in Philly. When she becomes a conduit for him to pass messages to his wife (who has a restraining order on him) he agrees to help her in her dance competition. Throw in De Niro, in a rare recent performance that isn't phoned in, as his OCD bookie dad and you've got a film. It's a cleverly written and well acted new spin on an old formula which makes it one of the best American rom-coms in recent years.