A Dangerous Woman

Debra Winger is still trying to prove herself as a dramatic actress. That's one of the driving forces behind A Dangerous Woman. The other key factor is Steven Spielberg, whose Amblin Entertainment company helped press the project along. Which explains the fact that A Dangerous Woman is laced with heavy-weight ambitions. Unfortunately, the final result is closer to a TV movie-of-the-week than heavy-hitting cinema.

In A Dangerous Woman, Winger goes dowdy as the slow-witted Martha, a woman whose thoughts and feelings are hidden behind a shell almost as thick as her glasses. She survives largely through the charity of her aunt (Barbara Hershey), a middle-aged widow who's preoccupied with problems involving her married politico lover. Especially after the spurned wife comes running through her front door in a car.

The demolished porch left behind by Mrs. Politico is the least of Martha's concerns. Her best friend (Chloe Webb) has a boyfriend who's stealing money from the cash register at the dry cleaner where they all work – and he's busy framing Martha for the theft.

The closest thing to a bright spot in her life is Mackey (Gabriel Byrne), a half-drunk handyman who shows up to fix the porch. When he's sober, he's a calm but compassionate observer of her dilemma. The bad news is, he's not often sober – he gets stewed every night and turns into an erratic mix of bitterness and passion. He is, however, apparently the only man who ever stood up for Martha, which fuels the attraction she feels for him. They have a fling that's briefer than a one-night stand, but one that bonds Martha to Mackey nonetheless.

Despite her wallflower persona, Martha possesses a very dangerous quality: she's incapable of telling a lie. Ironically, she's the person most threatened by this aspect of her personality.

A Dangerous Woman is being pitched as a thriller, but it isn't. It's a moody, down-beat character study laced with some bleak ironies.

Winger's performance in the film is quite good, but it's Hershey and Byrne who stand out. This isn't surprising from Hershey, who's one of the finest and most under-rated performers around. It's unexpected from Byrne, however, who seems bent on a career of playing a poetically drunken Irishman. He's good at it, but you get the feeling he's warming up for the bio-pic on Richard Harris.

A Dangerous Woman has a good, off-beat, dramatic feel. The only problem is that it doesn't take it far enough. It ends up being a small film that would have played great on the tube.