Déjà Vu

Sensitive New Age guy Henry Jaglom has always been a hopeful romantic. This haunting, unabashedly old-fashioned love story marks a further, more accessible departure for the fiercely independent Hollywood maverick and director of such love-them-or-hate-them confessional and obsessional films as Always (which starred himself and his ex-wife and dramatized their divorce), Eating and Babyfever. This rapturous ode to love-at-first-sight stars Jaglom's real-life wife Victoria Foyt (who also co-wrote the script) as Dana. At a cafe in Israel, she meets an elderly woman who spins a tale of lost love and then mysteriously vanishes, leaving behind a precious pin. Although Dana tries to find her, she finds Sean (Stephen Dillane), a painter, instead, and while there's an instant connection between them, she is engaged (albeit grudgingly) and he is married. True to its title, destiny and fate (and the coincidence-laden script) later conspire to bring these soulmates together. The concept of a simple two-shot still seems to elude Jaglom--he tends to pan between speakers and zoom slowly in and out--but the exotic locales (Paris, Dover's white cliffs), not to mention the venerable Vanessa Redgrave as a free spirit who encourages Dana to "jump into life," cast their spell. I won't even try to top one critic's observation that the supernatural denouement is like a Twilight Zone episode written by Fabio. Recommended. (K. Lee Benson)