A FRIEND IN NEED IS A FRIEND INDEED.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

``Flawless'' isn't.

A well-meaning and, in some respects, highly accomplished tolerance melodrama, the movie is ultimately undone by unnecessary plot distractions and, though they're interestingly detailed, uninvolving characterizations. Terrific performances from the two technically proficient leads and a diverse (to say the least) supporting cast go a long way toward keeping the film engaging from moment to moment. But they're not enough to make it amount to something that it just fundamentally is not.

Speaking of that aspiration, one of the movie's subjects describes himself as a woman trapped in a man's body. Cliched as that sounds - and it's far from the only cliche director Joel Schumacher indulges in his original script - Rusty the committed transvestite is nonetheless brought to vivid, hyper-charged life by Philip Seymour Hoffman.

The pudgy actor, noted for the alarmingly damaged individuals he's played with striking empathy in ``Happiness'' and ``Boogie Nights,'' goes all-out bravura with Rusty's feminine mannerisms, deep-dish neuroses and resilient compassion and courage. It's an appropriately over-the-top performance with a lot undergirding it, but memorable mostly because it's so big, not because the character is unique.

Robert De Niro is in a similar situation. His Walt Koontz is another resident of the Lower East Side tenement hotel where Rusty lives, a heroic and very conservative retired security guard. He hates the noisy drag queens who practice their show tunes in Rusty's fabulously cluttered apartment. But when Walt is laid low by a stroke, and his pride and physical infirmity prevent him from traveling to therapy, he must choke down his pride and take singing lessons from Rusty to regain control of his voice.

De Niro seems dead-on perfect, as ever, playing the subtlest tics and most devastating infirmities of a recovering stroke victim. He also superbly adapts Walt's short-tempered, intolerant personality into the needy mode, and plays the character's inevitable warming up to his despised benefactor with determinedly obnoxious difficulty. He even exposes Walt's (and the script's) most saving grace - the character's well-camouflaged vulnerability after a lifetime of intimate betrayals - with a resonant, stoic economy.

Still, you can't help but think of him as this week's disease person before you think of Walt as a fully formed individual.

For his part, Hoffman makes Rusty as overly defensive and snappish as he can be. For two polar opposites plot-forced to accept and even become friends with one another, these guys make it as hard, and by that as dramatically valid, as possible.

Unfortunately, that isn't the only drama on display here. There's a thoroughly unnecessary thriller theme involving stolen drug money that hijacks the climax to action movie territory (admirably more personal as this project is for him, Schumacher apparently couldn't bring himself to jettison the elements that people went to his Batman and John Grisham movies for).

We also get some idea of how New York's downscale drag community operates, but only an idea. There's a Flawless beauty pageant that we never see, arch encounters between flamboyant she-men and gay Republicans, and haughty snapping and slapping between rival transwhatevers. It all essentially reinforces stereotypes and avoids specific insight - and the same goes for the heart-of-gold/stone/rock cocaine dichotomies set up among the various hookers who populate the scenario.

Overall, ``Flawless'' marks a positive step in Schumacher's development, (though his last two films, ``Batman & Robin'' and the repulsive ``8mm,'' arguably left nowhere to go but up). It's also another impressive De Niro gimmick job and the most elaborate one of those yet from the talented and ever-developing Hoffman.

All the good parts just don't add up, though, to what the film and we wish it was.

The facts

The film: ``Flawless'' (R; language, violence, drug use).

The stars: Robert De Niro, Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Behind the scenes: Written and directed by Joel Schumacher. Produced by Jane Rosenthal. Released by MGM.

Running time: One hour, 50 minutes.

Playing: Citywide

Our rating: Two and one half stars.

CAPTION(S):

Photo

Photo: Philip Seymour Hoffman, left, and Robert De Niro co-star as neighbors who rely on each other in ``Flawless.''