'The Simian Line'

Harry Connick Jr. and Lynn Redgrave in the drama "The Simian Line." (Gabriel Film Group)

The curious title of Linda Yellen's "The Simian Line," a blithe but tart romantic comedy with a supernatural twist, refers to what the dithery psychic Arnita (Tyne Daly) discovers when she reads the palm of her elegant neighbor Katharine (Lynn Redgrave), suggesting her heart and head are "tied up together" in such a way that she cannot accept what is true in her heart unless it first rings true in her head.

In other words, her head tends to short-circuit the promptings of her heart.

It is a painfully accurate reading of Katharine, a lovely, radiant woman who lives in a splendid turn-of-the-20th century house on the promenade in Weehawken, N.J., which has a glorious view of the Manhattan skyline across the Hudson River. Katharine is a Realtor, a chic, brisk single woman, possibly a divorcee. She rents out portions of her great-grandfather's home, and, to her astonished delight, the "older woman" has found herself caught up in a romance with one of her tenants, Rick (Harry Connick Jr.), a young artist whose medium is leaded glass. Unfortunately but understandably, Katharine goes into a tizzy when Rick and her new next-door neighbor, Sandra (Cindy Crawford), strike up an acquaintance. Sandra needs Rick's assistance in her remodeling project and is so impressed with his work that she wants to help promote it to her contacts in Manhattan. While Katharine becomes increasingly jealous of her stunning neighbor, Sandra is actually coping patiently with her husband, Paul (Jamey Sheridan), who, under the utmost pressure in maneuvering a high-stakes business deal, takes out his stress by trying to dictate to his wife how to run her burgeoning party-planning business.

With uptight mates, Sandra and Rick find respite in each other's company but that is all. ("The Simian Line" offers the all-too-novel suggestion that even beautiful people can possess moral standards.) In the meantime, Katharine's attic tenants, struggling rock musicians Billy (Dylan Bruno) and Marta (Monica Keena), are experiencing their own crisis.

Much of the tension among the three couples is inadvertently escalated on Halloween Eve because Rick has hired Arnita to read fortunes at Katharine's dinner party. Forever protesting that her psychic gifts aren't taken seriously, Arnita foresees that one of the couples won't be together come New Year's Eve, which sets everyone on edge even as they scoff.

Arnita also discovers that Katharine's house is haunted by the ghost of her great-grandfather (William Hurt) awaiting the return of his wife, who left him in 1905. Keeping him company is the ghost of Mae (Samantha Mathis), a razzmatazz flapper gunned down in a speakeasy and a resident of Sandra's house when it was a '20s bordello. Only Arnita can see and hear them.

Yellen focuses primarily on Katharine and Rick. In our notoriously ageist society, Katharine has shown courage in allowing herself to become emotionally involved with Rick in the first place, but in her escalating insecurity, she is in danger of selling short both herself and Rick. She does not realize that the aging woman looking back at her in her mirror is not the woman--certainly not all the woman--Rick perceives and loves. Rick is uncomplicated because he possesses a self-knowledge that Katharine lacks. He is in fact a strong, highly principled man whom Katharine is in serious danger of losing.

Redgrave comes through with yet another unsparing, illuminating and stylish portrayal. With her Oscar-nominated performances as director James Whale's devoted housekeeper in "Gods and Monsters," in the current "Annihilation of Fish," as a faded belle fighting through romantic delusion, and now as the charismatic yet insecure Katharine, Redgrave may well be moving into the richest, most accomplished phase of an already notable career. Equally accomplished, Daly shows Arnita to be likable and wise beneath a deceptively neurotic surface and possessed of genuine psychic gifts.

These formidable actresses, abetted by a persuasive Connick, and by Hurt as the most genteel and benevolent of ghosts, set a high standard for a splendid ensemble cast that includes Eric Stoltz as a social worker and Jeremy Zelig as Marta's adorable 4-year-old son.

Yellen, a distinguished TV veteran, has been moving into theatrical features with increasing impressiveness. "The Simian Line" reveals her mastery of artifice and theatricality in the service of eliciting genuine emotion and insight into human nature.

MPAA-rated: R, for language and some sexuality. Times guidelines. The film is acceptable for mature, sophisticated older children.

'The Simian Line'

Lynn Redgrave...Katharine

Harry Connick Jr....Rick

Cindy Crawford...Sandra

William Hurt...Edward

Tyne Daly...Arnita

A Gabriel Film Group presentation of an S.L. production in association with DaWa Movies. Director Linda Yellen. Producer Robert Renfield. Executive producers Montel Williams, Daniel Bennett, Michael Escott. Screenplay Gisela Bernice; based on a story by Yellen and Michael Leeds. Cinematographer David Bridges. Editor Bob Jorrisen. Music Patrick Seymour. Costumes Tim Chappel. Production designer Henry Dunn. Set decorator Chelsea Maruskin.

Exclusively at the AMC Century 14, 10250 Santa Monica Blvd., Century City Shopping Center, (310) 289-4AMC; and the AMC Santa Monica Seven, Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica, (310) 289-4AMC.