LOST AND DELIRIOUS (2001)  *1/2

Reviewed 6/1/00

Canadian filmmaker Léa Poole’s second feature again presents a young woman dealing with her sexuality.  This time the woman, Paulie Oster, is a little older as played by Piper Perabo (COYOTE UGLY).  In boarding school, Paulie is deeply in love with her roommate Tory (Jessica Paré), and their relationship is seen by us through the eyes of third roommate Mary Bradford, nicknamed “Mouse” (Mischa Barton).  Tory’s younger sister stumbles upon Paulie and Tory naked in bed one morning, and Tory, for fear of estranging her conservative family, renounces Paulie and their relationship.

Poole makes this film so earnest, I almost feel bad for saying this, but, well, LOST AND DELIRIOUS is pretty awful.  Toss in some elements of DEAD POETS SOCIETY including its dreadful dialogue (still no match for PEARL HARBOR’s however), heaps of sentimentality, and an utterly banal storyline, and you get LOST AND DELIRIOUS.  The movie has no subtlety whatsoever.  Subplots about adopted Paulie looking for her birth mother and Mary’s issues with her stepmother and father go nowhere.  Judith Thompson, adapting from Susan Swan’s “The Wives of Bath,” must have recognized how bad her writing was because she replaces her dialogue with Shakespeare’s whenever possible.

Piper, Jessica (who resembles a more voluptuous Liv Tyler), and Mischa (who looks a bit like a young Sarah Michelle Gellar) certainly make up three incredibly attractive leads, almost too attractive in how these three happen to share one room, but only Jessica’s acting delivers any umph.   She still can’t overcome how underwritten her character is however.  The movie does have one of the best lit sex scenes in recent memory.

LOST AND DELIRIOUS may be found in various ongoing Gay and Lesbian film festivals and will be released later this year.