An unhealthy fixation on his high school English teacher leads to the title character’s very public crash-out in Will Ropp’s endearing feature directing debut, “Brian.” An anxiety-riddled stress case who careens from mood swing to mood swing like branches on a tree, Brian (“Karate Kid: Legends” star Ben Wang in a sweetly charming performance) opts to run for class president to get closer to Brooke (Natalie Morales), who’s the campaign advisor at a suburban high school. In the process, Brian winds up getting closer to himself, and to new gay student Justin (Joshua Colley) who becomes his best (and only) friend.
Ropp deftly handles the mental health issues his film grapples with without ostentatious showmanship; Brian’s issues are never spelled out, and that’s probably because he himself doesn’t fully understand them. He’s prone to outbursts and fits of rage that can involve almost ripping a desktop off its hinges or telling a drama teacher to go fuck himself.
Most of these bits are played for laughs, but it doesn’t mean “Brian” is insensitive, even as much as the protagonist is often the butt of the world’s cruel jokes. He’s also cripplingly unable to laugh at himself, and his combination of self-awareness, fumbling awkwardness, and wild fits very much conveys Adam Sandler as Barry Egan in “Punch-Drunk Love” energy.
Brian’s parents (Randall Park and Edi Patterson) and brother Kyle (Sam Song Li) maintain a probably too close and too open and honest relationship, for some — masturbation is spoken about openly, as is Park’s character’s bisexuality at one point. These are mostly cookie-cutter-kooky characters that don’t add much to the textures of the film, but they serve as interesting foils to see where the kid is coming from. Brian also has a perceptive therapist (William H. Macy, whose daughter Sophia Macy plays the insufferably precocious feminist campaigning against Brian) to help him get through the day to day, but most of his relationships are superficial at best because it’s so hard for people to get and to stay close to him.
That’s until new kid Justin arrives, having been kicked out of a neighboring Catholic school not just because he’s out and proud, but also because he told an authority figure he doesn’t believe in God. Colley (“Senior Year”) makes an impression as the type of too-cool-for-school student we all wish we could’ve been friends with at the most awkward phases in our lives. For Brian, that’s being 17 years old with no classmate confidantes to call his own. The common denominator in most of his classmates being turned against him is, of course, himself. He just hasn’t come to realize that yet.
Frantically searching for an extracurricular activity, Brian auditions for the student play but botches the tryout when he spews a raging fit on the director of the play; it’s too bad, because he would have made callbacks. (At one point earlier in this scene, a white female student does a cringe monologue reading from Patsy’s point of view in “12 Years a Slave.”) So when that doesn’t pan out, that’s how Brian ends up running for class president; Brooke is very much aware of and icked out by his crush on her, but “Brian” doesn’t play Brian and Brooke’s dynamic as anything that’s creepy.
Not all of the performances are uniformly excellent, and some of the one-liners Ropp writes in for Brian’s classmates and parents land awkwardly. Chinese American actor Wang, however, reaffirms his leading man capabilities in a teen comedy that’s all about embracing the awkwardness of high school.
Ropp’s darkly funny and ultimately sweet-natured comedy is a promising start for the actor-turned-director. With a little more scope, his next film will be even better.
Grade: B
“Brian” premiered at SXSW 2026. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution.
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