Fizzle, Sizzle at Cannes : ‘Kids’ Amounts to Less Than Its Hype, but Van Sant’s ‘To Die For’ Casts Nicole Kidman Darkly Into a Comedy

Although the rain of the first few days is gone, another kind of darkness has overtaken the Cannes Film Festival. Many of the most talked-about, the most surprising, even the most enjoyable films in the event turn out to have a glistening blackness at their core.

The most adroitly hyped of these pictures (hats off to Miramax, as always), “Kids,” ended up something of a fizzle. Directed by photographer Larry Clark, this fictionalized look at a day in the life of streetwise teen-agers in New York feels true to its off-putting subject matter. But authenticity is no guarantee of interest, and once the initial jolt of observing kids who look barely out of diapers talking dirty and having sex wears off, what remains is more tedious than shocking or even involving. Few adults would want to spend time with these case-hardened babies in real life, and “Kids” does not make them any more compelling on film.

At the other end of the spectrum, “Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead,” a roguish gangster comedy with a hidden romantic heart, proved to be as darkly enjoyable as its title. Laced with amusing tough-guy argot by screenwriter Scott Rosenberg and snappily directed by USC film school graduate Gary Fleder, “Denver” is filled to capacity with wacky but deadly criminals. Especially notable are a suave Andy Garcia as Jimmy the Saint and a surprising Treat Williams as Critical Bill, named not for his discernment but because everyone he crosses paths with ends up in critical condition. It’s that kind of a picture.

Perhaps the most surprising of the successes is Gus Van Sant’s quirky “To Die For,” a wicked and witty black comedy scripted by Buck Henry about the curious career of cable TV weatherperson Suzanne Stone, who fervently believes that “you’re not anybody in America unless you’re on TV.” And the least-expected thing about “To Die,” the name of its star, in some ways shouldn’t be unexpected at all.

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Snapshot. Having made her film debut at age 14, a girl in Australia decides that, like her idol Katharine Hepburn, she is going to make acting her entire life. “I wasn’t going to marry, I wasn’t going to have kids, I was just going to act.” Cast by Jane Campion in one of her student films, she has to turn the part down because of a school conflict. “I was really disappointed, but she wrote me a note saying, ‘Protect your talent.’ ”

Snapshot. After an Australian film called “Dead Calm” becomes an international success, she makes the obligatory visit to Hollywood. There is only one film she is eager to catch when she’s there: “Drugstore Cowboy,” Gus Van Sant’s breakthrough picture. “I’d heard it was really cutting-edge. I’ve wanted to work with him since then, he has such an original voice.”

Snapshot. “To Die For” premieres at Cannes and there is universal approval for the nerviness of her perfectly pitched poisonous comic performance. She takes time off from her latest picture, a “Portrait of a Lady” reunion with Jane Campion, to come to the festival and answer questions about how easily and inaccurately Hollywood tends to pigeonhole attractive women, especially one who ends up marrying a star like Tom Cruise.

“I find it a lot when I go up for jobs,” Nicole Kidman says, her long red hair and pale skin giving her a classic Pre-Raphaelite look even in the pink Gianni Versace suit she’s wearing as an “ode” to her character. “People’s perceptions of me changed because of my private life. They say, ‘Isn’t she the girl who’s married to Tom Cruise? Isn’t she acting because she wants to be famous?’ You’re judged by whatever information people have picked up.”

Kidman also doesn’t feel “I chose that by marrying Tom. Before you’re there, you don’t quite realize what it’s going to be like. I was probably naive about what the effects would be; I thought we’d get married and I’d just continue on as a young actor. But then ‘Far and Away’ [Ron Howard’s big-budget costume epic] came up and we jumped in. Probably that was the wrong decision.”

A level-headed and candid woman with an easy sense of humor, the actress laughs at the notion that any kind of “Team Kidman” gets together to pick her parts. “I have to make the decisions myself. You’re the actor, you’re the one who has to do it, the only person you have to blame is yourself.” In fact, when her agency sent over the “To Die For” script, it was not with the highest recommendation.

“They said, ‘It’s very dark, you probably won’t be interested.’ ” And there was also some feeling that, after having played an evil woman who menaces her husband in “Malice,” “I shouldn’t venture there again or people will talk. I told them Tom was still alive so nobody need worry.”

And given that Kidman’s personal taste runs toward “movies where you laugh when you know you really shouldn’t be laughing, after I read the script I had to go after it. I was told there were three things against me: I wasn’t American, I wasn’t supposed to be funny, and the character didn’t look like me. But when you hear that as an actor, you say, ‘Now I’ve really got to get to work.’ ”

Work included obtaining Van Sant’s home number, calling him up and convincing him over the phone that she was right for Suzanne. “You said you were destined to play the part,” Van Sant archly reminded her at the film’s press conference, and Kidman admitted, “I did say it, but I didn’t know that that was the thing that got me the role.”

Having moved from Los Angeles to London with Cruise and their two children in an attempt to live a saner, less fishbowl existence, Kidman hopes that her success in “To Die For” will make her eligible for the kinds of varied parts she has always wanted. “I’m happy when people say, ‘I didn’t know she could do that,’ ” the actress says. “I would have loved to have started from here when I first came to Hollywood. Now I’m starting to have fun.”