Intimate Strangers

2004, Paramount

Two strangers meet by chance in a tax lawyer's Paris office, and veteran French director Patrice Leconte (working from a script by Jérome Tonnerre) crafts romance and mesmerizing drama from their happenstance. As Anna, an unhappy wife on her way to a new therapist's office, Sandrine Bonnaire makes full use of her sultry voice, alluring eyes and slender figure.

The core dramatic sparks of Intimate Strangers occur when Anna mistakenly knocks on the wrong door, the offices of tax lawyer William Faber (Fabrice Luchini). She can't stop from spilling her anxieties to Faber, a loner who has lived his entire life in the same office and adjoining apartment. Faber immediately grows attached to Anna, and their meetings have mutual benefits.

Intimate Strangers is another of Leconte's trademark obsession tales, although less sexually charged than his previous films, The Hairdresser's Husband (1990) and Monsieur Hire (1988). Leconte wraps Anna and Faber's get-togethers with sentiment. Yet no one will accuse Leconte of making a Hollywood-like fairy tale.

Intimate Strangers is a welcome reunion for Bonnaire and Leconte, who also worked together on Monsieur Hire. Behind constant clouds of cigarette smoke, Bonnaire brings excitement and mystery to the story. Luchini, best known for his comic role as an arrogant arts critic in Rien sur Robert, makes full use of his wide eyes and boyish face. He is both fearful and entranced by Anna, especially when she's discussing her sex life.

Intimate Strangers is intimate in scale -- the majority of its scenes taking place in the same, shadowy office -- but powerful in its dramatic performances.

For Leconte, a second-generation French director who's become something of an esoteric pleasure with American audiences, his passionate and engrossing Intimate Strangers reminds us why French cinema is worth celebrating. And the Rest
Director Irwin Winkler and scriptwriter Jay Cocks break out of the musical biography box for their inspired musical portrait of composer Cole Porter (Kevin Kline), De-Lovely (MGM). Musical artists Alanis Morissette, Robbie Williams and Elvis Costello perform Porter's timeless songs with enthusiasm, but Kevin Kline gives the film its heart as the charismatic Porter. When Porter breaks into a rousing rendition of "Be A Clown" on the MGM back-lot, Kline enjoys a musical comedy moment worthy of his onscreen charm and song-and-dance talents. TV Reruns
The concept behind the USA Network five-episode series, The 4400 (Paramount), is great: 4,400 missing persons simultaneously return, still the ages they were when they vanished -- and many of them with supernatural abilities. Yet the series is mediocre at best with flat characters and a predictable plot. The 4400 is set to return for a second season in 2005, but with so many other science fiction options on television and DVD, audiences would do better to spend their time elsewhere. (Jessica C. Adams)