Despite the promisingly chilling concept of a man (Simon James, played by Jesse Eisenberg) being faced with his doppelganger (James Simon, Eisenberg again) Richard Ayoade's sophomore feature, The Double, is genuinely surprising and inventive. A first-rate psychological thriller will haunt you for weeks or even months, but The Double is most memorable for its black-as-coal humour.

Themes of suicide and especially loneliness were sensitively and emotively handled (you'll ache for Simon and Mia Wasikowska's Hannah to find each other), yet The Double is laugh-out-loud witty, as well as painfully sad. This is thanks in no small part to the return of Ayoade's Submarine cast – yes, pretty much all of them. Paddy Considine's cameo as the lead in a TV show within the film was a crowd favourite, and both Sally Hawkin's snarky receptionist and Craig Robert's suicide detective drew further appreciative sniggers (although for some the latter may prove an exception to the sensitive treatment of suicide).

Asked about his motivations for adapting Dostoevsky's book, Ayoade has explained how his collaborator Avi Korine considered the lead roles of Simon and James a great opportunity for an actor. With this in mind, Eisenberg may seem an odd bit of casting as he has given samey performances as gawky guys fighting to get the girl of his dreams (Adventureland, To Rome with Love). However, as James is everything Simon isn't, but wishes he could be, The Double allows Eisenberg to bring an understated sensitive-guy performance, together with a more brutal and unlikeable persona like that of his more celebrated work in The Social Network. He achieves impressive physical differentiation between the two characters; they walk and stand differently, and for this reason it's difficult to get confused for long about who's who.

Although it escalates rather fancifully in the final act, The Double is highly watchable and achieves the rare feat of balancing the serious and the comic, without ever seeming insincere. Judging from the divergent yet distinctive pairing of Submarine and The Double, Ayoade has certainly found his groove in the director's chair.