Directed by Neil Burger. Starring Bradley Cooper, Abbie Cornish, Robert De Niro, Anna Friel, Johnny Whitworth, Andrew Howard 15A cert, gen release, 104 min

YOU HAVE TO worry a little for Limitless. In recent years, the market for decent thrillers that are neither sequels nor remakes, that are not based on comic books, that do not carry the imprimatur of Christopher Nolan has been in miserable, apparently inexorable decline.

The film has done well enough in the US, but one wonders if any such beast can stay on its feet in such a climate.

Let's hope it prevails. Based on a 2001 book by Alan Glynn, a talented Irish writer, Limitlessdoes feel a little dated in its socio-economic concerns. The plot is a little unfocused; the flash is, at times, a bit too flashy. But, as high-concept romps go, Limitlessreally delivers. It's not the best film released this week, but it is the most fun.

You don’t have to be a writer to discern the origins of Glynn’s original concept. Bradley Cooper, the likeable, slyly charming star of The Hangover, stars as Eddie, a seriously blocked novelist. Eddie’s sink overflows with filth. His hair has matted into (by the standard of people like Bradley Cooper) neglected knots of greasy matter.

One day Eddie’s former brother in law, once a drug dealer, calls round and introduces him to a magic pill. One dose of this NZT-48 can unleash unimagined levels of creativity and turn even the weariest loser into an intellectual dynamo.

Eddie downs the drug and hammers out a saleable novel in a matter of days. He gives up the booze, tidies his flat, tones his body, learns a dozen languages and, after a few hours study, starts making fortunes on the stock exchange. (Would it be ill-spirited to point out that not every genius does the dishes regularly? It would. So, let’s pass on.)

Along the way, he encounters both a small-scale street hoodlum and a flash corporate raider. The latter, a Russian bruiser from whom Eddie borrows seed funding, begins lurking in the alleyways outside his door. The latter, played by a barely conscious Robert De Niro, is plotting a takeover of the financial universe.

Let’s deal with those few nagging issues. The Wall Street through which Eddie prowls – his career as a writer largely forgotten – behaves as it did when Glynn wrote the novel. Money is still fizzing about the streets and, summoning up memories of the Enron misunderstanding, Eddie’s new corporate partners believe the future is in energy trading. The film-makers cannot be blamed for including a tiny subplot involving Libya, but too much of the picture plays like a period piece.

All that noted, Limitlessoffers viewers a deliciously entertaining amalgam of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Flowers for Algernon (filmed as Charly). Edeie fast realises that, unless properly managed, the drug can cause distressing – not to say, murderous – side effects. He begins to imagine that, when hopped up, another, less pleasant version of himself prowls the streets inflicting awful mayhem in blameless quarters.

Meanwhile, it becomes apparent that Eddie is not the only citizen to mysteriously rise from obscurity to unexpected prominence. NZT users lurk in many powerful corridors.

Cooper has just the right combination of sleazy allure and ingenuous urgency for a character facing such a preposterous dilemma. Neil Burger, director of The Illusionist (the Ed Norton flick, not the animation), has the good sense to maintain a furious pace that rarely allows viewers to question the accumulating absurdities.

But the film is most notable for containing big ideas within a populist framework. Unlike poor Eddie, Limitlessis just about smart enough to get by without any artificial chemical bolstering. It deserves to be a hit.

yyy Donald Clarke meets Hollywood hunk du jour Bradley Cooper in tomorrow’s Irish Times Magazine