It's entirely possible that a sizeable portion of the audience for In the Cut won't be there because of the subject matter or the "name" director, Jane Campion, but because the lead actress, Meg Ryan, displays just about every asset that God gave her. Nudity, after all, has always been a big draw, and, when it comes to something like this, there's not much other reason to go. Ryan has gone on record saying that she accepted this role, with all that accompanied it, because she was interested in completing the image transformation begun with Hurlyburly and continued in Proof of Life. One can hardly deny that the film is racy. We see Ryan's breasts and buns, observe her simulating intercourse, masturbation, and oral sex, and get to determine how closely her "serious" fake orgasms match her most famous one. If your reason for seeing In the Cut is to watch America's sweetheart stripped bare, you'll get what you're looking for. On the other hand, if you're looking for a good movie, this one will disappoint.

The dramatic failure of In the Cut illustrates two things: (1) that women are not necessarily more restrained than men when it comes to making this kind of Grade B exploitation production, and (2) that it's virtually impossible to make a compelling mystery/thriller as a movie. Whodunnits are fine for books and mini-series, but the time and crowd-pleasing constraints of a motion picture severely hamstring such a project (to the point where it's virtually unworkable). Not only is there a need to sensationalize, but the law of economy of characters comes into play, meaning that "surprise" revelations are usually either cheesy or predictable. Such is the case with In the Cut. I won't give away the ending, but I can say that it is profoundly unsatisfying because it demands a few too many coincidences, and, even granting that those could happen, it still doesn't make sense.

Ryan is Frannie, a mousy New York City teacher who is looking for sex, but is too shy to go out and get it. One day, she meets Detective James Malloy (Mark Ruffalo) while he's scouring the neighborhood looking for body parts from the latest victim of a serial killer. Malloy asks Frannie out on a date, and, after a little prompting from her half-sister, Paulina (Jennifer Jason Leigh), she agrees. Things don't go well, and Frannie walks out of the bar before Malloy is ready to leave. On the way home, she is mugged, and this brings her once again into contact with the policeman. This time, the sparks between them cannot be denied, and they end up in bed together. But even as Frannie finds herself falling for Malloy, she begins to have doubts about him. Meanwhile, a mentally unhinged former lover (Kevin Bacon) is stalking her, and the serial killer has struck again.

This is certainly not Ryan's best performance (from a dramatic perspective, that would be in either Flesh and Bone or Hurlyburly), although it is her most revealing. For the material, it's adequate, although it lacks energy. Mark Ruffalo does a good job convincing us that his alter-ego is a self-centered jerk, although I'm not sure that's the intent. I think we're supposed to grudgingly like Malloy, but I never found him remotely affable. Kevin Bacon is amusing in a manic sort of way. And - surprise of surprises - Jennifer Jason Leigh (who has stripped numerous times in the past) keeps her clothes on (and arguably gives the best performance in the film).

One has to wonder why Campion would move forward with such a contrived, regurgitated script. In approach and style, if not in substance, it's very reminiscent of Basic Instinct. The main point here, as in the earlier film, is to use sex and violence to sell a motion picture that doesn't stand well on its own merits. The storylines for both films are implausible (even within the mystery thriller genre) and end with a cheat. The expectation is that Campion, who made The Piano, would be more discriminating, and that Meg Ryan would choose something with more intrinsic value in which to put her breasts on display. This is a bad movie, and no amount of erotic content can obscure that simple truth.