MOVIE REVIEW : LaLoggia’s ‘Lady in White’ Has Haas’ Appeal, but Little Else

For all its supernatural vein, “Lady in White” (citywide) has an engaging, Hardy Boys feeling about it and, in Lukas Haas, probably the screen’s most irresistible performer this side of Kermit the Frog. And every ounce of Master Haas’ adorability will be put to the test, because “Lady in White” is also a virtual junkyard of mismatched ideas and elements, thrown up on the screen in a friendly, haphazard fashion.

There is What Lukas Saw in the Cloakroom (a mysterious, transparent little girl), What Happened to Lukas in the Cloakroom (near-death by unseen hands), and What Lukas Found in the Cloakroom (that would be telling). And that’s only the warm-up.

This is played against genuinely warm scenes of Italian family comedy, probably coming straight from the boyhood memories of Frank LaLoggia, the film’s writer, director, co-producer, composer and arranger. There are also genuinely appalling camera flourishes and directorial touches, like the handling of the grade-school teacher or Haas’ two chums, and some pretty amazing scripting, like that point-blank assassination or the mind-boggling identity of the multiple murderer, let alone his motives. Those too, come from LaLoggia, who obviously went to a lot of movies when he was growing up and forgot all the right ones.

“Lady in White” also has swooping supernatural visitations, mostly from a mother and child spirit aching to be reunited. Since these goings-on take place in a town roughly the size of Santa Monica, it’s hard to know how they’ve been missing each other all these eons.

There are other excellent actors in this impenetrable thicket: Alex Rocco as Haas’ father, Len Cariou as the family’s lifelong friend, Katherine Helmond as a sort of vanilla float, Jason Presson as Haas’ affectionate older brother and Henry Harris as the school janitor. Somehow you suspect that all of them had a lot more fun making this PG-13-rated picture than we have sitting through it.

‘LADY IN WHITE’

A New Sky Productions presentation of a New Century/Vista Film Company release. Producers Andrew G. La Marca, Frank LaLoggia. Executive producers Charles M. LaLoggia, Cliff Payne. Writer, director Frank LaLoggia. Camera Russell Carpenter. Editor Steve Mann. Production design Richard K. Hummel. Costumes Jacqueline Saint Anne. Visual effects supervisors Ernest D. Farino, Gene Warren, Jr. With Lukas Haas, Len Cariou, Alex Rocco, Katherine Helmond, Jason Presson, Renata Vanni, Angelo Bertolini, Lucy Lee Flippen, Henry Harris, Rose Weaver.

Running time: 112 mins.

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