`DRY CLEANING' PRESSES THEME OF SIMMERING BISEXUALITY.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Critic

``Dry Cleaning'' is one of those French films that presumes upsetting middle-class propriety makes it profound. It's actually rather obvious and more than a tad trite, though it's also observant, convincingly played and - that other French specialty - stolidly analytical about life-altering emotions.

Charles Berling and Miou-Miou play Jean-Marie and Nicole Kunstler, a hard-working couple who've spent their lives together running a dry-cleaning business in a dull provincial town. They have a nice son and a comfortable apartment above the store, but no time or disposable cash for much else. Their last vacation was eight years ago, and that was to a trade show in Paris.

One night, after a meeting with other small-businesspeople to discuss a looming recession, the Kunstlers visit a cabaret that's featuring a brother-sister drag show. The next day, the male performer Loic (Stanislas Merhar) brings his stained dress to their store. The conservative couple is intrigued by the handsome young man, and after a second visit to the club they almost succumb to a night of wild passion with the siblings - which only leaves them even more curious and bothered.

When his sister takes off with some guy, Loic is left alone and destitute. The Kunstlers take him in, and he proves to be a very talented pants-presser. He's even more adept at coaxing Nicole out of her jeans, but it's Jean-Marie he's really interested in. As for the man of the house, Jean-Marie can't tell if he's jealous of Loic or attracted to him. Either way, it's freaking him out.

There's a complex balance of affections in this triangle; everybody seems to truly care for everybody else, even as they're driving one another nuts.

Miou-Miou was not the most impressive actress to emerge from the late French New Wave, but she does some of her soundest work here as she poignantly exposes a good but frustrated woman's desperate need for excitement - or for something, anything, a little different from the usual routine.

The men are good but go more for standard interpretations, Berling heavy on stuffy and sensitive and Merhar coy and needling. Director Anne Fontaine isn't overly imaginative, either. She seems to think that the discovery of repressed bisexuality is the height of interpersonal drama.

Fontaine is actually more perceptive about offhand behavioral details. Despite their crushing ordinariness, the people in ``Dry Cleaning'' are quite interesting. It's the plotting and thematic agenda that's affected by the fumes.

THE FACTS

The film: ``Dry Cleaning'' (NR; sex, nudity, language, violence).

The stars: Miou-Miou, Charles Berling, Stanislas Merhar.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Anne Fontaine. Written by Fontaine, Gilles Taurand and Claude Arnaud. Produced by Phillipe Carcassonne and Alain Sarde. Released by Strand Releasing.

Running time: One hour, 37 minutes.

Playing: Laemmle Music Hall, Beverly Hills.

Our rating: Three stars.