`HEAVY' CARRIES THE WEIGHT OF LONELINESS, LONGING.

Byline: Janet Maslin The New York Times

When Callie (Liv Tyler), a naive young beauty, is hired as a new waitress at the roadside tavern where James Mangold's ``Heavy'' unfolds, not much is said. Not much needs to be.

The effects of Callie's arrival are quietly earthshaking, and Mangold assesses them with such simple clarity and precision that he might as well be defining the points of a compass. It takes only a few revealing words and glances for ``Heavy'' to establish not only Callie's impact but also Mangold's own.

As the writer and director of this eloquent, purposeful film (and the winner of a grand jury prize for best direction at the Sundance Film Festival last year), Mangold instantly invites his audience to know everything about the denizens of Pete and Dolly's homey restaurant in the Hudson Valley.

``I'm being punished,'' decides Delores (Deborah Harry), the hard-boiled senior waitress, when she sees Callie walk in. ``Maybe Dolly thinks she'll bring in some business,'' surmises Leo (Joe Grifasi), a customer who's fixated on Delores and permanently attached to one end of the bar.

But Dolly (Shelley Winters), who runs her restaurant so commandingly it's hard to imagine the role her husband, Pete, played when he was alive, appears to have hired Callie with something else in mind. Or somebody: Victor (Pruitt Taylor Vince), Dolly's painfully shy son, who works as the pizza chef and is so timid he can barely speak.

The film's title describes not only Victor's 250-pound bulk (about which he is painfully self-conscious) but also the psychic load he carries. Guilty, furtive, an inveterate mama's boy, Victor takes one look at Callie and sees everything he yearns for but may never have.

``Big as an ox, but nobody sees you,'' one stranger says teasingly about Victor. Nobody but the audience: Though Mangold keeps his main character nearly silent as he moves through the action, the film's watchful style focuses attention on Victor even when he doesn't speak.

As the small, intimate ``Heavy'' progresses, the reticent Victor is goaded by both Callie's presence and an unforeseen crisis to face his crushing loneliness and to wonder if he can change his life. That's a tall order. And it's not certain that anyone would notice even if he tried.

Though ``Heavy'' begins beautifully, it isn't always able to sustain its balance between narrative subtlety and inertia. Vince does a fine, touching job of capturing his character's darty-eyed fearfulness, but some of Victor's reactions become repetitive, if only because his character is so perfectly defined at the film's start.

Mangold's direction has superlative economy, but his screenplay is more slack. Yet even the film's chanciest moments sustain an overall poignancy. Some of Victor's most tender encounters with Callie look like fantasies even before ``Heavy'' reveals them to be; still, the effect is startling and clear.

An impressive consistency links the crisp, specific look of ``Heavy'' (with cinematography by Michael Barrow), its claustrophobic yet evocative production design (Michael Shaw), Thurston Moore's gentle score and the actors' understated excellence.

Neither Winters nor Harry is known for reticence, yet both give carefully modulated performances here. Winters, who's especially good, captures Dolly's strength without making her an overbearing caricature. Grifasi, a veteran of so many thankless character roles, also has a chance to shine.

While Vince transforms himself so affectingly into a secretive, desperately unhappy figure, it's hard to imagine the film working so well without the stunning catalyst it has in Callie. Tyler, who can also be seen serving a similar purpose in Bernardo Bertolucci's ``Stealing Beauty,'' gives a charmingly ingenuous performance, betraying no self-consciousness about her lush good looks.

Sweetly girlish yet never coy, she slips effortlessly into the daydreams of a loner like Victor, who still keeps a Farrah Fawcett poster on his bedroom wall.

And if Callie looks too golden, ``Heavy'' gives her a self-involved boyfriend (Evan Dando of the Lemonheads, blithely strumming his guitar) who takes her for granted and leaves her lonely. Everyone in this lean, artful drama knows how exactly loneliness feels.

THE FACTS The film: ``Heavy'' (not rated).

Behind the scenes: Written and directed by James Mangold. Edited by Meg Reticker. Music by Thurston Moore. Produced by Richard Miller. Released by Cinepix Film Properties.

Running time: One hour, 45 minutes.

Playing: Encino Town Center, Sunset 5, Goldwyn Pavilion Cinemas.

Our rating: Three Stars.