A cult comic hit

Harvey Pekar is a miserable sod, but at some point he broke through his sullen misanthropy to reach out to fellow miseryguts via, weirdly, a comic strip.

Drawn by Robert Crumb, among others, the humdrum, gripe-filled days of Pekar became a cult hit, and it's now a cult film, thanks largely to the remarkable inventiveness of writers/directors Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini.

They mix animation, acting and interview with a wild playfulness that draws the viewer in, although it still can't quite drag Harvey out of his doldrums.