Gray Matters

It's a glum experience watching good talent go wrong. With Heather Graham, star of the wrong-headed -- make that dunderheaded -- coming-out romantic comedy Gray Matters, you wonder how she could let all the goodwill she established by playing lively, erotic young women in Boogie Nights and Two Girls and a Guy waste away on her pursuit of dreadfully cutesy starring vehicles. Graham is one of the most stunningly attractive actresses around. Tall and generously proportioned with blonde hair and an aura of sensuality, she's out of a European movie from the 1950s or 1960s, but she also has big, darting eyes that give off a girl-next-door approachability. Her problem in Gray Matters is that she's chosen a script for those eyes rather than her other attributes. She's neutered herself. The film, poorly directed and written by Sue Kramer, is virtually tone deaf to the way actual people live and act and is written like a cable-channel sitcom that is pleading for a cheap laugh. Heather Graham, please escape stuff like this. Go see what David Lynch or Martin Scorsese are up to. (Steven Rosen) Grade: C-