'@SuicideRoom

Polish writer-director Jan Komasa's @SuicideRoom serves up stylish teen angst drama to tell a tale of a humiliated high school student's emotional descent. Popular rich kid Dominik (Jakub Gierszal) finds his privileged life wrecked when a video clip capturing a drunken party joke—Dominik accepted a dare by friends to kiss a male pal—is posted on the Internet. Antagonized by his classmates, dropped by his girlfriend, and barely acknowledged by his oblivious parents, Dominik retreats into cyberspace, where he connects with other teens at a website called the Suicide Room—a digital sanctuary that lets teens share details of their persecution while shedding their real-life identities in favor of slick avatars. @SuicideRoom boasts amazing animated sequences that almost throw it off-kilter, since the live-action stretches lack the style and imagination on display in the film's virtual world. Gierszal gives a so-so performance—the handsome young actor looks great on camera, but he never truly plumbs the anguish of Dominik's pain or embodies the empowerment of his avatar rebirth. Of course, in view of the growing number of teen suicides related to merciless bullying, this film could also be seen as being somewhat questionable in taste. Optional. (P. Hall)