You are looking at a photo of a man in a coffee shop. He is wearing a straw hat, frayed around the edges. His hair is white underneath, and long. His hand is grasping a coffee cup, but he is not looking at it. He is looking at someone out of frame, making a gesture with his free hand: fingers extended, palm pointed slightly diagonal and down. The universal sign for “This is the important part.” In mid-gesture, he is animated. He does not seem to know he is being photographed.

This is how Denis Piel might have posed the scene of himself being interviewed about his latest book, Moments. The photographer with the flair for the cinematic is set to release a coffee table collection later this month with Rizzoli. Moments is a series of images, mainly of models and actresses, that Mr. Piel shot on the set of various advertising and editorial campaigns during his tenure in the ’80s as of one the magazine world’s Big Names.

His more famous works can be seen on the covers of Vogue, Vanity Fair and GQ; in 1979 he was handpicked by Condé Nast’s Editorial Director Alexander Liberman, along with Irving Penn and Richard Avedon, as one of the few photographers to ever have a contract with the publishing house. Over the course of his tenure, Mr. Piel shot more than 1,000 editorial spreads in the U.S., German, Italian, French and English versions of Condé Nast titles.

Before Annie Leibovitz draped a sheet over a 15-year-old Miley Cyrus and called it a day; before Terry Richardson made it into Page Six with accusations of masturbating in front of naked models he was shooting, Mr. Piel and his contemporaries were displaying their contributions to the century-old “art-or-pornography” debate on the front pages of magazines and fashion spreads for luxury products.

But besides the transgressive nature of partial nudity in a high-end glossy, the comparisons between Mr. Piel and his contemporaries—which also included Vogue’s preferred cover fashion photog, Helmut Newton—are few and far between.
“They were very, very, very ... and I’ll add another very, different,” former Vogue editor Grace Mirabella recalled of the famous cover photographers in the ’80s. “Helmut—who was superb, had a great sense of style—was always looking for the deepest, not-best story about the women. In other words, he put them in situations that were very uncomfortable, that was this close to being excessively sexy, and almost questionable.”

Mr. Avedon, meanwhile, was “the strongest” in fashion history, according to Ms. Mirabella, with his monochromatic, soul-penetrating portraits. And Mr. Piel? “Would it be superficial of me to say that his were the most attractive?” she wondered.

“He was the best of his moment. He was able to get the allure of the model while still keeping this sense of reality that was missing from a lot of the more posed shoots.”

“He was not the usual type ... if you could consider photographers of this period a type,” Jade Hobson, the creative director of Vogue at the peak of Mr. Piel’s fame, told The Observer. “For example, he had an Australian accent.”

He also had a casualness in both dress and demeanor that put models at ease: “With Denis, he was always looking for that ‘off’ moment. So many photographers at that time were looking for the girls to be ‘on,’ but Denis wanted that awkward moment between a pose. He was looking for something more real.”

“His was the antithesis of a fashion shot,” she concluded.

In truth, Mr. Piel is more interested in models who can act (and vice versa) than ones who just blindly follow direction. He can (and will) proudly claim that he was the first photographer to have actress Uma Thurman sit for a shoot. There she is in Moments, at age 16, pouting and pulling at an oversized wifebeater that looks in danger of falling off at any second.

The photographer admits to being partial to curvier woman (as defined in the realm of modeling, that is), which also made him an outlier of fashion photography. Isabella Rossellini frequently appears in Moments, as do Rosemary McGrotha and the ill-fated Gia Carangi.

“I wasn’t round, but I wasn’t rail-thin,” former model/actress and frequent Piel collaborator Amanda Pays told The Observer. “He was interested in the female body in a more sort of natural form.”

Ms. Pays admitted that she had originally been uncomfortable with the idea of doing a nude photo for Mr. Piel for a personal collection (though she got to keep her hat in the shot, which she used as a fig leaf). “But there was not something not creepy about Denis. It wasn’t so much about being naked as it was getting to know you as a person. Doing a portrait that was just a little bit deeper than a physical picture.”

Perhaps because, like the saying goes, what he really wanted to do was direct.

“With my photos, I really want to do is tell a story. I want to set up a mise-en-scène,” Mr. Piel expounded, dropping some film vocabulary into an explanation of his famous 1983 photo “Video #4.” (The snapshot features Nastassja Kinski on a red couch, holding a phallic-seeming video camera. She is clothed only in fishnets and a black mesh bra.)

“What a picture really does is make you think about what happened right before the photo was taken, or what’s about to happen.”

Mr. Piel cites as inspiration not another photographer, but Stanley Kubrick: the director had planned to write an introduction to Mr. Piel’s book, but passed away before seeing it to fruition.

“What was great about Kubrick was that he never told the same story twice. He didn’t need to brand himself; instead of today, where people make 10 movies and you feel like you’ve just seen one.”

Mr. Piel’s cinematic flourishes define his body of work. Peter Arnell, the creative director for Donna Karan’s seminal ad campaigns in the ’80s, recalled collaborating with Mr. Piel for shoots of hyper-realistic city scenes. This series of photos evolved into a video ad, which follows Ms. Karan as she is driven around New York, trying on clothes and getting ready for a date. Ms. Karan’s inner thoughts are conveyed in a pre-Carrie Bradshaw monologue of soundbites: “I live for luxury, but the real thing ... an afternoon nap”; “Dark glasses are like being behind a waterfall ... safe and daring at the same time,” and “God, why won’t he call?”

“The video was revolutionary,” Mr. Arnell stated as a matter of fact. “That’s because the best way to engage an artist of Denis’s talent is to explore, and not go in with very tight preconceived notions, like this definitely has to be a print, or it has to be television. Denis was so excited to do film, and he was really able to capture the idea of the modern woman on the go, which is what Donna wanted.”

Ms. McGrotha, who met Denis Piel on an Elle shoot in the ’80s, became one of his most frequently photographed subjects. She remembered him as more as a Kubrick-type obsessive, sometimes having her hold poses for hours while setting up the lights for cameras with low shutter speeds.

“He was very intense, very precise. He always wanted you to live a certain role ... there was a lot of role-playing of different characters,” Ms. McGrotha sighed. “But sometimes he’d want your personality, which was a lot harder.”

Mr. Piel saw the idea of models “playing themselves” somewhat differently. “Sometimes I would go on shoots, and I’d take my own pictures first. Like the Vogue story we did on Amanda [Pays], I took her picture first, before the shoot. I like to get as raw as I can, as much of the personality in the model before they are all made up and artificial.” An odd word choice for a fashion photographer.

He explained: “When Andie MacDowell was chosen to do Sex, Lies and Videotape, the director was very clever. He cast her to not act. She was herself, she was playing herself. And that’s why she was so great in that film.”

Ms. MacDowell was a former model of Mr. Piel, posing for him in Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue in 1985.

“He shot me in my early 20s, when I had just finished wrapping St. Elmo’s Fire,” the Southern-twanged actress told The Observer over the phone. “But I wasn’t a star by any means. I was an introvert, so it was good for me to work with someone like Denis, because he worked like a director. He always came up with some kind of ideas or concepts of a character you’d be playing. He was getting people to play out these roles, and it gave them an opportunity to be bolder than a model normally would.”

Eventually Mr. Piel did become a director: In 1995, he directed his own feature, Love is Blind. The documentary chronicles the first year of marriage between two blind people. Mr. Piel refers to it as “the beginning of reality television.”

After Condé Nast, Mr. Piel found himself as something of artistic futurist. He formed several creative collectives, like the Umbershoot, a virtual “ideasbank” where independent filmmakers could share their work and cross-pollinate techniques and theories. It went belly-up in the dot-com bust. Still ... no regrets.

“Our idea was to have films distributed online; today that’s a reality,” Mr. Piel said. So he was right after all.

Of course, he is best remembered for his photographs. Hence Moments, which he hopes will re-establish him in the art world.
“I was planning to do a book for years, but never got around to it. And then I looked around, and saw that my position within my peers had been lost,” Mr. Piel lamented.

Today, Mr. Piel is excited about a new project—one that takes his latest obsession and combines it with photography—turning the 17th century chateau in the South of France where he currently resides into a “sustainable hotel environment”-slash-“utopian Eden.”

“We’re really into permaculture right now,” Mr. Piel said. “I want to take pictures of this fantasy of a tomorrow where the world has collapsed. People have to think, ‘Well, how am I going to eat? How am I going to live?’ They’ll have to figure out their relationship to the Earth.”

He plans on portraying this fantasy future with a photographic series where semi-nude women interact with nature.

And why wouldn’t they be clothed?

“Well, because we won’t need clothes,” Mr. Piel replied. Ever the pragmatist, he quickly added, “Or maybe we do. Maybe it’s just minimum clothes.”

Andie MacDowell (Getty Images)

Tonight on ABC Family brings another installment of girl-of-a-certain-moment and makeup spokesmodel Andie MacDowell's latest reinvention. Hard to remember now, but Ms. MacDowell was once the go-to gal for quality motion picture entertainment. Have any of your favorite--have any legitimately talented?--actresses ever starred in five movies as good as sex, lies, and videotape; Green Card; Short Cuts; Groundhog Day; and Four Weddings and a Funeral in a span of five years? Her streak was remarkable though her talents were, well, ineffable, and, like her fellow 1990s movie queen Madeleine Stowe, she's landed on the small screen. She plays a high-gloss fashion designer in the teen aspirational drama Jane By Design; being the queen of movies for half a decade is certainly something to which to aspire, though surely none of Jane By Design's intended audience is familiar.

Set your DVR for ABC Family at 9pm.

Bell, Bosworth and Aselton try On some shades for size.

While it seemed most of the action at the Sundance film festival had been happening at night behind colossal bouncers, The Observer caught wind that there was an equally exciting, yet slightly bizarre, scene taking place in the light of day: celebrity gifting suites. We took the opportunity to start our day a bit earlier to see what all the commotion was.

First stop: The Bertolli Meal Soup Chalet Hosted By Gen Art

• New York's own Byrdie Bell let us ride shotgun as she had her war paint applied by the Finns from Lumene Cosmetics, from whom The Observer dodged a graciously offered full male makeup treatment: "Don't you want your eyes to pop like hers?" (We kind of did.)
• Justin Long squeezed through a pack of iPhone wielding moms to pick up a pair of shades gratis from the Solstice team, who had just successfully equipped Kate Bosworth, Lake Bell and Katie Aselton—none of whom could determine if they liked skiing over snowboarding.
• Andie Macdowell's still got it. Like, really still has it.

Next stop: Talent Resources gifting suite (someone told me they had free Cream of Wheat samples)

• Bumped into producer Malcolm Pullinger of Wholphin and McSweeny's fame, who joined our investigation into these Cream of Wheat rumors.
• SNL's Nasim Pedrad leaned over a tall counter to snag herself some shwag from Sean John, noting that she really likes "the boy stuff, how 'bout that cardigan?" The team was all too happy to oblige.
• Cream of Wheat CENTRAL!

Moving right along: The Gansevoort gifting thing

• Are you a celebrity? Do you have feet? Do your naked feet need Sorel boots? These were the hard hitting questions being lobbed at John Heder by boot babes as he laced up.
• Everyone is wearing these freaking boots, getting the vibe that everyone may also be a little drunk.

Looks like there's a football game on? Back to the soup mongers to check in on the Giants

• OH MAN Christina Hendricks - hang on though, who's this dude she's with? Googling...Googling...she's married!?!
• Luckiest man in the world, Geoffery Arend everybody!
• Nap time.

Nursed back to health, The Observer hopped a cab back to main street to see what The Bing Bar had to offer

• Is that Andrew Keegan? Where the heck has that guy been? Oh right - practically living at The Bing Bar.
• Cobra Starship, expressing that they indeed had the capability to "go to eleven, if necessary" serenaded the crowd with more than their fair share of sweeping arpeggios.

Park City Live: Let there be Deadmau5

Deadmau5 takes Park City Live by storm.

• Waiting for Deadmau5, aka. Joel Zimmerman to assault the stage with his signature brand of electronic dance music, we run into Tenjune's Eugene Remm at his table stageside: "Can you believe this shit man? They have a pour limiter on our bottle service!" The Observer momentarily commiserated with the frustration of not being able to drink more than one shot of Patron simultaneously.
• Uh oh: the sound system is struggling. Zimmerman takes the stage.
• Promptly blows 3 speakers.
• Still somehow lights the place on fire, despite kind of phoning it in.

A quick pitstop at Chris Masterson's birthday party, and we're headed back to Tao

• We copped a squat on a banquette with the hard-to-miss king of clubs Noah Tepperberg, as he reigned over a roundtable in the house he built. We canvassed Noah on how he got here, who after promising to reveal to us at a later date told The Observer, "You don't want to know how the fuck I got here." We absolutely did.
• Fresh off the premiere of his film Red Hook Summer, director Spike Lee set up shop with a hulking posse directly in front of DJ Sinatra's dj booth, immediately proceeding to do their thing.
• Our ears are broken.

Meanwhile, Mr. Tyler was dropping by Glamour magazine’s Women of the Year awards at Carnegie Hall to cheer on poet Maya Angelou, who was being presented a lifetime achievement award by president Bill Clinton. Mr. Tyler, who seemed a bit loopy and tired, said that he’s been “having way too much fun” and then something about a sobriety check. His girlfriend, Erin Brady, was by his side, draped in a massive fur coat, though the singer, wearing an embroidered floral jacket, told reporters he was also there to support animal-friendly designer Stella McCartney, daughter of Paul.

“Stella is fabulous. I go in and buy purses all the time. You know how androgynous I am,” Mr. Tyler said. And then, imitating himself: “Stella! Thirty percent rock discount!”

A reporter asked him how Mr. Tyler gets ready for nights out. “I ask sweet Jesus to please make me not stutter and then I give her a kiss,” he said, leaning over and smooching Ms. Brady, “and then I ask Marco where we’re going and make sure my makeup looks all right and from there we just”—and here he began singing—“follow-the-yellow-brick-road! Ha-ha-ha.” (“Marco” was presumably record producer Mark Hunter, who was part of Mr. Tyler’s entourage that evening.)

Next up were released-from-captivity journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who were being presented an award by actress Catherine Zeta-Jones.

“I’m excited to just say hello to him again tonight,” said Ms. Ling. “President Clinton has called a couple of times to check in on us and we’ve had dinner with him and Chelsea.” Oooh, fancy!

Actress Andie MacDowell arrived with 20-year-old daughter Rainey Qualley, an aspiring actress dressed in a curve-enhancing Herve Leger dress. “I tell her to accept herself and to be confident,” Ms. MacDowell said when asked what sort of womanly advice she has passed on to Ms. Qualley. Then Ms. MacDowell told her beautiful daughter that she had lipstick on her teeth. Ms. Qualley used her finger to wipe it off.

Real Housewives of New York member Alex McCord arrived with husband Simon van Kempen, and was noticeably displeased when told that while she was welcome to pose for photos, the red-carpet interviews were restricted to honorees and their presenters.

Next came Precious actress Gabourey Sidibe, who told reporters that she would like to star in something lighter than her current critically acclaimed film. “I think I’m funny and my mom thinks I’m funny, so yes, we think I should do a comedy,” she said, laughing. Supermodel Iman, there to present an award to Rihanna, saw Ms. Sidibe and squealed. “I never met you before and now I see you twice in one week!” said Iman. “I love your dress,” the young actress replied, admiring Iman’s feathered Jason Wu mini.

“Sorry. Iman,” she told reporters after the interruption, rolling her eyes and breaking into a childish giggle.

Country singer Kellie Pickler is a bit of a skirt chaser.

“I think it’s sexy,” the platinum blond 22-year-old former American Idol contestant told the Daily Transom. “I think it’s great. Real men wear kilts!”

Ladies, not so much! Ms. Pickler wore a non-plaid Gwen Russell-designed red gown to the “Dressed to Kilt” fashion show, organized by the Friends of Scotland and hosted by the hilly country’s reigning king, the actor Sean Connery, at the M2 Ultra Lounge in Chelsea on Monday night, March 30.

Mr. Connery, who himself sported a kilt for the same event three years ago, was noticeably hiding his still-sturdy 78-year-old stems this time around.

The Daily Transom was stunned to learn that the famed Scot has never actually worn the traditional man skirt in any of his movies, a secret the original James Bond divulged as he zipped along the red carpet. (Turns out, the actor George Lazenby was the only 007 to slip into a kilt on screen.)

“I’m going to be shy and wear my underwear,” said 21-year-old actor Ed Westwick of Gossip Girl fame, a self-confessed kilt virgin, prior to his maiden bare-legged voyage down the catwalk.

Mr. Westwick was joined on the runway by fellow actors Andie MacDowell and Mike Myers, among others, who strutted their stuff in front of a panel of judges that included New York Social Diary’s David Patrick Columbia, former Project Runway contestant Laura Bennett, and restaurateur Angus McIndoe, a legitimate Scotsman!

Before her catwalk, Ms. MacDowell informed the Daily Transom of her deep Scottish roots, which dated back to at least the 1700s, when her ancestors were lords of a region called Galloway (look it up).

But had she ever worn a kilt? No. Her young daughter wanted to. "But she wanted it to be short,” the matronly Ms. MacDowell said. They wore full-length dresses instead.

Alex McCord, co-star of the Bravo series The Real Housewives of New York City, came clad in a short-length tartan dress that she has proudly owned since the age of 19. It still fits!

Her husband, Simon Van Kempen, on the other hand, does not possess a similar predilection for Celtic fashion. He doesn’t own a single kilt.

That doesn’t mean Ms. McCord didn’t enjoy the evening’s ample views.

“As long as the man wearing the kilt has good legs, I am very happy to look,” she said, “especially if there is a gust of wind.”

One can understand why critics received Mystic River so rapturously, and at the same time be completely baffled as to what is so great about the film's story, which reads more "made for TV" than "silver screen." Clint Eastwood directs the rather unremarkable crime narrative about three longtime friends from a lower-class Boston neighborhood who drift apart, but are reunited later in life after the murder of one's teenage daughter.

Based on the novel by Dennis Lehane, the film's direction is much like the Dirty Harry star's own acting style: no frills. Watching dramatically raw scenes like a distraught Sean Penn getting wrestled to the ground by a gang of police officers, you can practically hear Mr. Eastwood's raspy whisper: "Go ahead, Oscar-make my day!"

No wonder the actors love him (or so we learn from the DVD's special "featurettes"): His direction never detracts from their performances, as so many of the C.G.I.-laden big-budget spectacles do today. He understands their craft personally, with an empathetic understanding of where, exactly, to put the camera to capture their brilliant conveyances.

And that is the essence of Mystic River 's popularity. It's a film buoyed by excellent, career-defining performances by Mr. Penn and Tim Robbins (who both won Academy Awards), Marcia Gay Harden (who was nominated), Kevin Bacon, Laurence Fishburne and Laura Linney.

Though Mr. Eastwood was also nominated, being a great director of actors, alas, was not enough to beat out a director of one of those C.G.I.-laden, big-budget movies.

[ Mystic River (2003), R, 137 min., $39.98.]

Tales of the Ape

Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan , the epitome of the strong, silent type, has seen countless onscreen permutations over the years: multiple movies, a TV series, a cartoon, not to mention too much pornography for even our young, willing fist. There doesn't seem to be much more that can be mined from this franchise (though surely Jerry Bruckheimer will find a way).

Now, for your viewing pleasure, Warner Home Video has released "The Tarzan Collection," six films starring former Olympic swimmer Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan; as well as Tarzan the Ape Man (1981), directed by John Derek and starring his wife Bo and the beefy Miles O'Keeffe; and the failed 1984 epic Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, The Lord of the Apes with Christopher Lambert and introducing Andie MacDowell (in her first movie role, though Glenn Close's voice was famously dubbed in after Ms. MacDowell, a Southerner, couldn't pull off a proper British accent).

Even though the Weissmuller films were made over 60 years ago, they prove to be the easiest to watch, a sort of proto–Discovery Channel. Unfortunately, squirm-worthy scenes in which African tribesmen are whipped like cattle by the intrepid white ivory hunters show the films' true age.

The latter titles, however, are just more proof that Hollywood was in extremely dire straits in the early 80's. Mr. Derek took every chance to dunk his white-dress-clad wife in water. It's Girls Gone Wild: The English Classics Edition . Meanwhile, Greystoke is a three-hour odyssey that remains as faithful to the source material as possible (it even eliminates Tarzan's trademark call), which is a horrible idea. There is only so much "authentic" grunting and whooping one can take.

All the films have certain specific things in common. Never, ever does Tarzan appear unshaven, even in Greystoke , where Tarzan's first language lesson is conducted at the same time he learns to wield a razor. All the male leads boast bulging pecs, bulging loincloths and dim visages. And, of course, Tarzan always shags Jane-eventually. Ms. O'Sullivan is the most prudish of all the Janes, holding out until the second film. Obviously, in the Weissmuller-O'Sullivan films (dating back to the F.D.R. administration), Jane and Tarzan never do the jungle boogie onscreen; rather, as in Tarzan Escapes , we see a budding flower dropping from her hand and floating listlessly downstream.

[The Tarzan Collection: Tarzan the Ape Man (1932), NR, 99 min.; Tarzan and His Mate (1934), NR, 116 min.; Tarzan Escapes (1936), NR, 90 min.; Tarzan Finds a Son! (1939), NR, 82 min.; Tarzan's Secret Treasure (1941), NR, 81 min.; Tarzan's New York Adventure (1942), NR, 71 min., $59.92; Tarzan the Ape Man (1981), R, 107 min., $19.97; Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984), PG, 143 min., $19.97.]

And so I find myself liking John McKay's Crush , from his own screenplay, possibly more than I should. The big problem for most critics with this movie is Andie MacDowell. She has been making critics angry ever since her performance as Ann in Steven Soderbergh's Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989), in which all the sympathy went to Laura San Giacomo's Cynthia, who is sleeping with Ann's husband even though they are sisters. In Mike Newell's Four Weddings and a Funeral , Ms. MacDowell not only took the Hugh Grant character away from Kristin Scott Thomas and Anna Chancellor, she also casually and amusedly enumerated all her previous affairs in the process. Ms. MacDowell projects a sheltered existence while at the same time flashing the kind of beauty that screams entitlement. She has never played a loser in the game of love; indeed, she'd probably break up her best friend's wedding without working up a sweat. Critics seem unwilling to forgive her for this romantic armor. So naturally I have taken up her cause as the female Rob Lowe, who needed The West Wing to prove that he was not a gorgeous joke.

In Crush , Ms. MacDowell, Imelda Staunton and Ms. Chancellor play a convivial trio of 40-ish career women willingly buried in the low-key, small-scale and hilly-nilly English Cotswolds, where everyone knows everyone else's business. Ms. MacDowell is Kate, a school headmistress; Ms. Staunton is Janine, a policewoman; and Ms. Chancellor is Molly, an overqualified physician. They love to debauch themselves on wine and chocolates as they gossip about their neighbors and reveal their own disastrous encounters with men, having wasted their 20's and 30's on an assortment of one-night stands and failed marriages.

Then, suddenly, Cupid's arrow strikes Kate as she trades amorous glances with a 25-year-old former student named Jed (Kenny Doughty). A leisurely camera movement across foliage reveals Kate and Jed in flagrante delicto in the first of many trysts. When Janine and Molly learn that Kate's infatuation is growing into a full-fledged love affair, Janine takes it in stride, but Molly goes ballistic and manages maliciously-though in the end inadvertently-to precipitate a disastrous end to the affair.

Somehow, the three women manage to reunite after a temporary rupture, and this is what the critics seem to hate most of all about the film. Yet when I think about Crush in terms of conceptual consistency, there could have been no other ending. This is a film primarily about three women and how they sustain each other through the coming crisis of old age, which is staring at them from their respective mirrors. This is a crisis in which Jed-lovable and hunky as he turns out to be-can not long participate. Dave Kehr of The New York Times cited Douglas Sirk's All That Heaven Allows (1955), with Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson, as a parallel for the Kate-Jed romance. I would suggest instead Vincent Sherman and John Van Druten's Old Acquaintance (1943), the last scene of which shows the hitherto-bickering Bette Davis and Miriam Hopkins preparing to spend the rest of their lives together.

Oh God, how I love the old chick flicks! And some of the new ones, like Crush , aren't that bad either.

There's also Charles Herman-Wurmfeld's Kissing Jessica Stein , from a screenplay by the film's two leads, Jennifer Westfeldt and Heather Juergensen, which has been generally dismissed and demeaned as a lightweight lesbian romance-but a closer look at its comic contours reveals the dimensions of a classic screwball comedy from pre–World War II Hollywood, but without the conformist strictures of the old Production Code.

The old Hollywood heroines, after all, would never have even considered kissing another woman on the lips. Jessica (Ms. Westfeldt) and Helen (Ms. Juergensen) are made of sterner stuff, though both remain technically bisexual, and the "happy ending" for Jessica comes in the form of a previously rejected boyfriend, Josh (Scott Cohen).

What makes the film break the relatively new gay-film formula is the wit and charm of the two actresses, who have written themselves some sparkling lines, such as designating James Woods and Mick Jagger as "sexy-ugly" and having Helen describe Jessica to a friend as a "Jewish Sandra Dee." Truth to tell, if you find Ms. Westfeldt's Jessica too ditzy for your taste, you won't find the goings-on very interesting. I happened to see the movie after the negative reviews came out, and I was surprised to find myself likening Ms. Westfeldt to a cross between Jean Arthur and Diane Keaton, and Ms. Juergensen to a sultrier brunette in the "other woman" tradition. Also true to form, Helen is always pressuring a reluctant Jessica to "go all the way" after their first kiss.

This is the way that gay subject matter has been domesticated, at least in the restricted zones of art-house cinema and cable-television programs like Sex and the City and Six Feet Under . In a kind of throw-away joke near the end of Crush , Ms. Chancellor's Molly publicly and audaciously kisses another woman on the lips, who promptly kisses her back.

In the movies, all comedy is hard-and romantic comedy is even harder. By ending the demonization of lesbianism, today's pushing-the-envelope filmmakers have added a new wild card to the deck. But it will take more than mere broad-mindedness to create vibrant comedy.

Argentina's Native Son

Juan José Campanella's Son of the Bride was last year's Argentine Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Language Film. It evolves as the quintessential male-midlife-crisis movie as it follows 42-year-old Rafael Belvedere (Ricardo Darín) while he operates the highly successful but time-consuming restaurant his father Nino (Héctor Alterio) founded. Despite his success, Rafael continues to live in the shadow of his unimpressed father. Rafael seldom visits his mother (Norma Aleandro), who was similarly unappreciative-even before she succumbed to Alzheimer's. Even Rafael's ex-wife finds reason to resent him, because he has neglected their daughter. Finally, Rafael's beautiful girlfriend Naty (Natalie Verbeke) is unable to break through his shell of self-involvement to obtain a long-term commitment.

Then, suddenly, a minor heart attack forces Rafael to slow down and smell the roses. He sells the restaurant and is reunited with a childhood friend, Juan Carlos (Eduardo Blanco), who has survived a much greater personal tragedy, and who thereafter functions as a clownish poltergeist.

When Rafael's hitherto anti-clerical father decides to remarry his ailing wife in a church, as she had always dreamed of doing, Rafael clears away the formidable obstacles to such a sanctification, and in so doing mends his own personal relationships.

This is a sweet film, one not without a certain emotional intelligence and fleeting bursts of wit and humor. The only problem is an overloaded plot that makes the breakdowns in Rafael's relationships seem beyond repair in a 24-hour-a-day existence. Yet the cast alone makes all the difference in retaining the film's credibility.

Sister Act

Lieven Debrauwer's Pauline and Paulette , from a screenplay by Mr. Debrauwer and Jacques Boon, is a Belgian gem on the twilight existence of four sisters of a certain age drawn together reluctantly by the need to care for one of their number: the mentally retarded Pauline (Dora van der Groen), who lives with Martha in a small town near Brussels, but adores Paulette (Ann Petersen) who operates a fabric shop in town and plays the plump lead in an operetta, her life's dream.

When Martha suffers a fatal heart attack, the problem of caring for Pauline is thrust upon the equally reluctant Paulette and the Brussels-based younger sister, Cecile (Rosemarie Bergmans). Martha's will stipulates that Pauline must be cared for by one of her two surviving sisters, or the considerable money from the sale of Martha's house will go directly for Pauline's care in an institution.

This is the kind of movie that is mired for a long time in the embarrassments of mental retardation. Yet Paulette and Cecile are not monsters-they try their best to cope in turn with Pauline's streaks of stubborn self-absorption. But then a miracle occurs in an epiphany of sisterly love, and the film ends with an emotionally shattering tableau of two sisters sharing a view of the Belgian coast and the birds flying around it. The acting is superb, and the mise en scène is enlivened by obsessive colors and floral arrangements.

Dorothy McGuire: Underrated Till The End

Dorothy McGuire (1918-2001) was the most underrated actress in Hollywood in the 40's and 50's, and the injustice continued into this year's Oscars, which omitted her from the "in memoriam" montage. Here are my 10 favorite McGuire performances:

1. The Spiral Staircase (1946)

2. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945)

3. The Enchanted Cottage (1945)

4. Claudia (1943)

5. Friendly Persuasion (1956)

6. The Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960)

7. Mister 880 (1950)

8. Gentleman's Agreement (1947)

9. Invitation (1952)

10. Till the End of Time (1946)

The message had come from Milan: Giorgio Armani was throwing a special party in March that he wanted Nobu to cater. So a representative of the TriBeCa eatery-the culinary collaboration of chef Nobu Matsuhisa, actor Robert De Niro and restaurateur Drew Nieporent-was dispatched from New York to see what the fashion designer had in mind.

Sources familiar with the situation told The Transom that after touring the location where the party was to be held and learning that a private jet would be dispatched to transport chefs from the newly opened Nobu in London to Milan, the Nobu agent brought up the issue of the catering staff's uniforms. Nobu's employees usually are garbed in Issey Miyake uniforms. That might prove problematic, given that this was an Armani party. Indeed, the fashion designer's representatives had something else in mind: a vest that seemed distinctly Chinese in influence. Apparently, it was not long after that Nobu's man in Italy learned that Armani's people were somehow under the mistaken impression that Nobu and Mr. Matsuhisa were purveyors of Chinese cuisine.

Mr. Armani arrived soon after, and a molto heated discussion occurred, in Italian, between Mr. Armani and his employees, which apparently contained many utterances of the word giapponese .

"I don't know how they thought that we were Chinese," said Kurt Zdesar, the assistant manager at London's Nobu, who said he was familiar with the incident. "We do often get designer types in here. Perhaps they were confused with what we were actually doing."

But, Linda Gaunt, a spokeswoman for Armani's U.S. operations, denied the story. "There was a chance that they were going to use Nobu, but they didn't," she said. "They changed the direction of the party at the last minute," and ultimately, she said, used an Italian caterer. Yet The Transom hears that Mr. Armani actually sent a letter apologizing for the unfortunate mix-up.

Power's Tools

"No, no, no. You don't understand."

Daniel Boulud had not even reached the entrance of his restaurant, and already things were not as they were supposed to be. Waiters struggled to align several green coconuts, each with a decorative frond sprouting from it, into a boundary for the makeshift bar that had been set up on the sidewalk on East 76th Street. Mr. Boulud, in navy blue suit and tie, had stopped to point out to his employees that the coconuts were backward. Then, barking orders in French, the chef and restaurateur turned his attention to rearranging tables and chairs in the al fresco setting where cocktails would be served in approximately 15 minutes to more than 100 of the country's top chefs and restaurateurs.

At least Mr. Boulud did not have to worry about rain. Three months ago, scaffolding had been erected around the hotel building that houses Daniel for what management told him would be one month of work. So recently, Mr. Boulud decided to have the crisscrossing metal struts in front of his boîte sheathed in Spanish moss, creating an urban topiary. Satisfied with the setup, Mr. Boulud checked his watch; then, with a grim smile on his face, he looked in the direction of the jackhammer that was pounding incessantly across the street.

Sacré bleu! Where was the justice in this? Mr. Boulud had just come from a press conference at which Daniel had been named the city's best restaurant in Gourmet magazine's current Top Tables issue. Somehow, Mr. Boulud's reward included the opportunity to cook lunch for Danny Meyer and Tom Colicchio (Gramercy Tavern), Maguy LeCoze and Eric Ripert (Le Bernardin), Anne Rosenszweig (Arcadia), Charlie Palmer (Aureole), Michael Weinstein and Eberhard Muller (Lutèce) and scores more of the country's most sophisticated and snobby foodies.

The jackhammer hammered. Mr. Boulud stood with his arms folded. And then a smile crossed his face. "It's going to cost me $50, but I think I give him something," the chef said. Perhaps he would also feed the man whose power tool was threatening to ruin the afternoon.

As Mr. Boulud hustled inside the restaurant, one of the event's organizers asked him if he wanted a seat at the luncheon. "No, no, no. I'm not going to eat," he said emphatically. "If I want, I will bring a chair for myself." Mr. Boulud disappeared into the telephone-booth-size room off Daniel's kitchen that is his office. He emerged minutes later in his chef's whites. The fusillade of French began again, and Mr. Boulud moved to the center of the action-a long stainless-steel table where the afternoon's canapés were being prepared. Among them were seven-herb fritters and something called "pomponette[s] of porcini and black truffle." A small army-the restaurant's day and night teams had been called in-converged around the table to put the finishing touches on the hors d'oeuvres.

"This is one of the craziest days in the four years that we've been open," said Alex Lee, Daniel's chef de cuisine , as he helped organize the ballet of workers. Mr. Lee said that he was also cooking dinner that night for the James Beard Foundation. (What he didn't say was that it was his birthday. Tant pis !)

Mr. Boulud said something unintelligible and jetted off toward one of the kitchen's walk-in coolers. Mr. Lee yelled after him, "It's done! It's done! C'est fini ," halting his boss' trajectory. Mr. Boulud returned to the table, made a few finishing touches, and then his voice boomed out. "Waiters, please! Cocktail! Let's go!"

The waiters, in their double-breasted dark green jackets, filed up to the stainless steel table to pick up their trays. Mr. Boulud explained what they would be serving to the crowd, then cautioned them, "Be careful with the platters." The canapé trays had been painstakingly, sometimes decadently decorated to accent their contents. On one, for instance, five black truffles, not intended for consumption, ringed the hors d'oeuvres. "Don't move them," Mr. Boulud warned, "so we don't have to redo the platters."

As waiters gingerly took their trays through the swinging kitchen door, Mr. Boulud announced to his staff, "We have a half-hour at least." He would return then to help construct the next course, personally ladling a fragrant tomato-and-herb consommé over small towers of Maine crab and avocado, but first he would have to make an appearance at the cocktail party.

Mr. Boulud joined the crowd outside and encountered … silence. The jackhammer across the street lay abandoned near its air compressor. The man who was operating it was nowhere to be found.

One problem solved, another appeared to take its place. Mr. Boulud was now due at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 76th Street for an interview with Fox News. He was accompanied by Lespinasse's chef Gray Kunz, who had won Gourmet's top honors last year and finished second this year; and Tom Colicchio, the chef at Gramercy Tavern, which took 12th place.

Mr. Boulud looked at his watch and saw his half-hour draining away as the Fox reporter tried to get in touch with her newsroom. Then she explained that she would ask Mr. Boulud his thoughts about taking top honors this year and ask Mr. Kunz about what it meant to win last year. As attention turned to Mr. Colicchio, Mr. Boulud smiled and said that his question would be, "What's it's going to mean [to win] next year?"

If only Mr. Colicchio knew.

Andie's Underpants

Andie MacDowell had already shocked those assembled at Bergdorf-Goodman's shindig for designer Alberta Ferretti. In town to promote her new film, The End of Violence , the actress had showed up at the Sept. 10 event not in haute couture, but in ancienne couture (in the form of an antique bead-and-tulle piece she bought in Paris). What really got them going, however, was the topic of her lingerie.

It seems that during a shoot for Kevyn Aucoin's book, The Art of Makeup , Ms. MacDowell shared belly laughs with stylist Freddie Leiba over her girlish underpants, which were patterned with polka dots and bows. As backpack-wearing-Eddie Bauer, not Kate Spade-Mr. Leiba and a wine-swilling reporter from the BBC hooted over the sassiness of it all, Ferretti's P.R. director, Michelle Stein, wandered over. Ms. MacDowell quickly recapped the story. "Well," said Ms. Stein, who thought that panties with bows were just perfect for a good Southern girl like South Carolina-born Ms. MacDowell, "what panties are you wearing tonight?"

"None!" replied the actress, to the delight of the group, followed fairly swiftly by a "just kidding."

Sadly, the moment didn't last. Ms. MacDowell, perhaps thinking better of her disclosure, was in the elevator before her glass of wine arrived.

– Kate Kelly