QUITTING []

——

THE plot of Chinese director Zhang Yang’s psychodrama sounds quite ordinary: A popular young actor has a nervous breakdown, brought on by booze and drugs, that lands him in a mental ward.

But there’s a big difference here. The story is true and the actor (Jia Hong-sheng of the lovely “Suzhou River”), his parents and sister, and the patients and staff of the hospital all appear as themselves.

Zhang, whose “Shower” showed here a few years ago, has done an amazing job of getting realistic performances from his mainly nonprofessional cast. You would think they were seasoned pros.

If only “reality” TV was as realistic as “Quitting.”

In Mandarin, with English subtitles. Running time: 112 minutes. Not rated (violence). At the Lincoln Plaza and the Quad.