`Relax. . .It's Just Sex' Takes A Couple Turns And Ends Up A Provocative Drama

Movie review XXX "Relax . . . It's Just Sex," with Mitchell Anderson, Jennifer Tilly, T.C. Carson, Lori Petty, Serena Scott Thomas. Directed and written by P.J. Castellaneta. 106 minutes. Broadway Market Cinemas. No rating; includes profanity, sex scenes.

First shown here at last spring's Seattle International Film Festival, "Relax . . . It's Just Sex" starts out as a quip-heavy "Ellen"-style sitcom about Southern California gays and lesbians, then turns into a provocative debate on the effectiveness of AZT and AIDS "cocktails."

Before it's over, the movie has transformed itself once more, into a soul-searching drama about a gay-bashing in which the victim, Vincey (played by Mitchell Anderson), turns the tables on his attacker and rapes him. His friends are horrified, yet this suddenly empowered playwright is almost proud of himself for fighting back. This unexpected streak of violence leads to a rift with his friends.

Anderson, best-known as the violin teacher on Fox's "Party of Five," is smoothly teamed here with a quartet of veteran Oscar nominees (Jennifer Tilly, Seymour Cassel, Susan Tyrell, Paul Winfield) in a storyline that juggles a dozen characters with more hits than misses.

Tilly is a standout as Vincey's gossipy best friend, Tara, who more or less takes over the movie. Lori Petty is persuasively intense as Robin, a butch lesbian who falls for Sarina (Cynda Williams) when Sarina's longtime girlfriend (Serena Scott Thomas) ends up in bed with a man (Billy Wirth).

T.C. Carson is both amusingly dense and entirely credible as Buzz, a politically incorrect dinner guest and AIDS widower who nearly gets thrown out of Tara's house when he jilts Vincey and starts pushing his theories about the true causes of AIDS. He ends up successfully courting Eddie (Javi Rogero), the HIV-positive brother of Tara's restless lover.

"Relax" marks a radical change from writer-director P.J. Castellaneta's two-character, one-room debut movie, "Together Alone." It's quite a job for a traffic manager, let alone a filmmaker who's had no experience juggling so many characters.

For the most part, he handles the balancing act quite efficiently, allowing the famous actors in bit parts (especially Tyrell as a meddling mother and Winfield as an aging observer) just enough room to make an impact, while giving the lesser well-known performers in leading roles plenty of reasons to demonstrate why they're getting more screen time.

Even the infuriatingly contented gay couple, Dwight (Gibbs Toldsdorf) and Diego (Chris Cleveland), who are dubbed the "Ozzie and Harriet" of this extended family, get a chance to redeem themselves. We first see these physically perfect boys having rambunctious sex while discussing a dinner menu they're planning, and they're such outrageous types that they're kind of endearing.

Yes, they do fit certain cliches about West Hollywood gym queens. No, that doesn't make them less than human. Much of "Relax" works that way.

The movie's biggest problem: Castellaneta's tendency to underline a New Agey "author's message." When he delivers it full force at the end, complete with happy tears at a beach at sunset, it feels like a commercial for cockeyed optimism.