`General's Daughter' Is Offensive And Sleazy

Movie review XX "The General's Daughter," with John Travolta, Madeleine Stowe, James Woods, Timothy Hutton, James Cromwell. Directed by Simon West, from a script by Christopher Bertolini and William Goldman. 115 minutes. Several theaters. "R" - Restricted because of language, violence, graphic rape scene.

Mainstream studio movies don't get much sleazier than this overcooked military whodunit, in which a gang rape scene is staged on the hallucinatory scale of "Apocalypse Now."

The title character, Elizabeth Campbell (Leslie Stefanson) is an Army shrink, the daughter of a Vietnam veteran, Gen. Joe Campbell (James Cromwell). She makes her first appearance helping an Army detective (John Travolta) fix his flat tire while playfully introducing herself as a woman who likes to play with people's minds. Before long, she's tied to the ground with stakes, raped and strangled.

During his investigation of her death, Travolta and his assistant (Madeleine Stowe) find a batch of videotapes that recorded Campbell's sado-masochistic sex sessions with various soldiers. Travolta announces that her death had something to do with the way she conducted her life, suggesting that, in the words of one soldier, rape is a crime caused by "a woman who changes her mind afterward."

Based on Nelson DeMille's 1992 best seller, "The General's Daughter" supposedly condemns this kind of thinking, yet the script (reportedly the work of six writers, most of them uncredited) is crammed with such justifications. We're told that the soldiers who attacked Campbell had "a whale of a time," and that the victim deserved her treatment "for being smarter . . . "

Her one female defender reports that she was "real good for women in the Army . . . a lot of people don't like that we're here." The film's final credits report that the script is based on a true story, a case that had an impact on the way women are now treated in the military.

If so, this ugly story needs more depth to justify its two-hour running time. Its idea of profundity is suggested by a character who wonders "What's worse than rape?" One of the victim's friends (James Woods) responds that "when you find that out, you'll know everything."

As a movie, "The General's Daughter" could also use more suspense. The general and his protective aide (Clarence Williams III) are introduced as prime candidates for covering up the murder. The script never suggests that they could have any other function. Casting Cromwell in this role, so soon after he played a vicious official in "L.A. Confidential," is a major miscalculation.

Expanding on the Southern drawl he perfected for "Primary Colors," Travolta comes on like a mixture of Bill Clinton and Andy Griffith's demagogue in "A Face in the Crowd," though eventually he calms down.

Stowe is less aggressive and more effective. In her best moments, such as the scene in which she invades an Army locker room and tells a too-confident soldier that he could "never lead a rape," she makes the material seem better than it is.

The film's glib director, Simon West, gives Stowe some room to explore this character, though it's never enough. More often he resorts to trumped-up action scenes involving machine-gun attacks, deadly propeller blades, exploding mine fields and menacing helicopters - none of which have much to do with the story. But with all that Army hardware around, how could he resist?