`China Moon' Plot OK, But Script Is Lacking

Movie review

XX "China Moon," with Ed Harris, Madeleine Stowe, Benicio Del Toro, Charles Dance. Directed by John Bailey, from a script by Roy Carlson. Broadway Market, Everett Mall, Renton Village, SeaTac North. "R" - Restricted because of nudity, language, violence. -----------------------------------------------------------------

What a difference three years can make in an actor's career.

Shortly after she finished this half-baked film noir in 1991, Madeleine Stowe found a niche playing more mature and independent heroines in such wildly different movies as "Blink," "Short Cuts" and "The Last of the Mohicans."

Now "China Moon" has come back to haunt her - as well as audiences who don't need to know that the movie's been on the shelf to detect a stale odor. There's something musty about the whole enterprise, which resembles "Body Heat" without a sense of humor. And when a movie like this can't have fun with itself, the audience is bound to provide its own laughs.

That's what happened last night at a promotional screening at the Broadway Market, where Stowe's most melodramatic moments reduced some of her fans to giggles. It was almost shocking to hear her spouting lines like "We have to talk" and "I just needed some time" and "Don't look at me like that." While she lends conviction to everything she does, this parade of couple-in-trouble cliches just about sinks her efforts.

The script by Roy Carlson, who wrote last year's made-for-cable fizzle, "The Wrong Man," doesn't provide her co-stars, Ed Harris and Charles Dance, with much snappier dialogue. In the key role of her philandering husband, Dance never gets a chance to suggest how these two people could ever have shared a life together.

As the homicide detective who falls for her, Harris somehow sweeps her off her feet by telling her he's "an orphan of destiny" while repeating "you're so beautiful" like a mantra. What does she see in this guy? We're supposed to believe that she's crazy about him, yet their relationship makes less sense than her marriage.

A former cinematographer ("Ordinary People") making his directing debut, John Bailey gives the picture a handsome wide-screen look, but he can't help the actors locate anything in these characters to make us care. It's easier to be more concerned about the starving cats Stowe finds after she's left home for several days.

What makes the movie tolerable is the plot, which delivers just enough twists at the right moments to keep you watching and guessing. While the setup is almost identical to "Body Heat" - seductive married woman convinces her chump of a boyfriend to help her murder her wealthy husband - little else is. The surprises are fun even when they approach self-parody.

Shelved because of Orion Pictures' financial troubles, "China Moon" joins such delayed Orion releases as "Married to It," "Car 54, Where Are You?," "The Dark Half" and "Love Field." Variety has dubbed the collection "Orion's Dusty Dozen." Still to come are "The Favor," "There Goes My Baby" and the late Tony Richardson's "Blue Sky."