
DATE: Thursday, November 20, 1997           TAG: 9711200066

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E5   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Movie Review

SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC 

                                            LENGTH:   71 lines

``STAND'' A THOUGHTFUL FILM ABOUT GUILT

``ONE NIGHT STAND'' is a film about guilt.

It is, in fact, about the after-effects of marital infidelity. A husband, who is normally a devoted family man, wanders one night, and one night only. He spends years experiencing a mixture of guilt and fantasy about the memory. When he meets the woman again years later, the guilt, as well as the fantasy, resurfaces.

What might have been a lurid melodrama is actually a thoughtful psychological drama, done up in stylish, European-looking coolness by director Mike Figgis, who proves that his beautifully textured, introspective ``Leaving Las Vegas'' was no fluke.

Wesley Snipes, the straying man, spends too much of his time trying to seem cool and hip. He plays a successful TV-commercial director who meets the mysterious Nastassia Kinski during a trip to New York. He gives her would-be romantic leers that were in style back when Rudolph Valentino played ``The Sheik'' but are a little obvious nowadays.

No matter. We soon get the idea that he isn't really just an overheated out-of-towner. The two go to a concert of the Juilliard String Quartet, seemingly to prove they are both educated and classy. They whisper things in each other's ears during the concert - things we can't hear. What do two perfect strangers on the verge of sex whisper to each other during a classical string quartet? And if they were so classy, why are they talking at all during a concert?

After an attempted mugging, he ends up back in her hotel room and she makes the classic statement: ``We're both adults. We're both married. It's the least I can do.'' He spends the night, and then doesn't see her again for years.

It's the emptiness of his life that makes the film compelling, and proves that vapidity can be dramatically interesting. Ming-Na Wen (of TV's ``Star Trek: The Next Generation'' and ``The Single Guy'') is both likable and feisty as his wife. Kinski is refreshingly subdued as the love interest. She was proclaimed as a new star several decades ago when Roman Polanski directed her in ``Tess.'' As it turns out, she is one of those actresses who is only interesting when she has little to say. Here, she is practically silent.

A subplot involves Robert Downey Jr. as a much-loved friend of all the characters. He is dying of AIDS. Kyle MacLachlan, a business acquaintance of Snipes', turns out to be Kinski's husband.

It's a small world, and a one-night stand can turn out to be a psyche-wrenching affair. Unlike most of the folks in movies nowadays, these are not characters who would take such a night for granted. For one of the few times in recent movies, sex is played with hesitancy.

The so-called ``surprise'' ending almost ruins the film because it negates the smallness of all that has gone before.

But ``One Night Stand'' is a surprise in that it is not the usual tawdry melodrama that one would have expected from this title and this casting. This is a genuinely thoughtful movie.

It might do more good than a visit to a marriage counselor - and it's cheaper. ILLUSTRATION: Photo

NEW LINE CINEMA

Wesley Snipes and Nastassia Kinski star in the psychological drama

``One Night Stand.''

Graphic

MOVIE REVIEW

``One Night Stand''

Cast: Wesley Snipes, Nasatassia Kinski, Ming-Na Wen, Robert

Downey Jr. Kyle MacLachlan

Director: Mike Figgis

MPAA rating: R (partial nudity, sexual situations)

Mal's rating: Three stars