MOVIE REVIEW : ‘THE GIRL IN THE PICTURE’ IS SWEET BUT UNINSPIRED

Remember Gordon John Sinclair, the gangly, ginger-haired Scottish kid who was such a winner in “Gregory’s Girl”?

Well, he’s back, now grown up and billing himself John Gordon-Sinclair in “The Girl in the Picture” (opening Friday at the Westside Pavilion). His hair’s a little darker, he’s filled out a bit and his new movie is even slighter than the earlier one, impossible as that would seem (it’s not a sequel, but easily could be).

Debuting writer-director Cary Parker leans pretty hard on the enduring charm of Victorian brownstoned Glasgow, tweedy clothes and, of course, the Scottish burr (“perfect,” when pronounced “pairfect,” is hard to resist).

In contrast with the tongue-tied, girl-crazy high schooler of “Gregory’s Girl,” Sinclair is here a photographer with a live-in lover (Irina Brook, a beauty). And that’s the rub: The romance has lost its bloom, but Brook moves out before he’s able to screw up his courage and tell her so. Once she’s gone, he discovers that he really loves her.

In the spirit of fair play, you try hard to banish all thoughts of “About Last Night” from your mind, but as “The Girl in the Picture” (rated PG-13 for adult situations) becomes less and less as it progresses, the more impossible this becomes. In comparison to the American film, which has both sustained kinetic energy and those old indispensable virtues--solid construction and character development--the Scottish picture seems languid and seriously underwritten. (Ironically, Parker is an American, diverted permanently, the press kit tells us, from his studies in civil engineering at Georgia Tech after having seen “McCabe and Mrs. Miller.”)

Parker’s sense of humor is as sweet as it is uninspired. Every time we’re returned to the pallid running gag of Sinclair’s boss trying to grow a ficus in a darkroom--just how many laughs or even smiles can you hope to get out of this?--we realize how precious screen time could have been put to much better use by revealing something of Sinclair and especially Brook, who remains essentially a lovely cipher.

This lack of substance is never clearer than at the film’s end when Sinclair says to Brook, acknowledging that they weren’t happy together, “The only happy people I know are idiots. I don’t want to be happy. I want to be miserable with you.” It’s a key phrase, given away in the film’s ad copy, but we’re left realizing we never got to know the young man capable of such an insight--or the young woman to whom it’s directed.

‘THE GIRL IN THE PICTURE’

A Samuel Goldwyn Co. release. Producer Paddy Higson. Writer-director Cary Parker. Camera Dick Pope. Production designer Gemma Jackson. Costumes Mary-Jane Reyner. Film editor Bert Eeles. With John Gordon-Sinclair, Irina Brook, David McKay, Gregor Fisher, Caroline Guthrie, Paul Young, Rikki Fulton, Simone Lahbib, Helen Pike, Joyce Deans.

Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes.

MPAA rating: PG-13 (parents are strongly cautioned; some material may be inappropriate for children under 13).