BROSNAN WEARS `CROWN' WELL.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

Probably the closest juvenilized, modern Hollywood is going to get to a real adult caper film for a while, ``The Thomas Crown Affair'' doesn't always juggle cool and heat adroitly. But the fact that it even tries, with measured, mature deliberateness, places this one in a whole higher grade than the year's earlier, more frivolous attempt at high-stakes (he)art theft, ``Entrapment.''

The remake is also arguably an improvement on the original ``Crown Affair,'' the Steve McQueen-Faye Dunaway artifact from 1968 that was more concerned with heists and visual gimmicks. Poorly as it may have aged, though, the ``Crown'' concept had an irresistible hook: wealthy master thief is stalked by superchic female insurance investigator, both use their sex appeal to enchant and outsmart the other.

What's nice about the remake, which was directed with a certain delicacy by the usually bombastic John McTiernan (``Die Hard,'' ``The Hunt for Red October''), is that all the erotic cat-and-mousing here isn't just a game - and as if to prove it, the famous, suggestive chess sequence hasn't been repeated from the original. The new pair of sophisticated loners, played rather too obscurely by Pierce Brosnan and with nicely contrasted boldness and yearning by Rene Russo, really put their feelings on the line.

There have been other changes, most rather felicitous. Brosnan's Crown is not a professional bank robber but a self-made financier with a love of fine art. He loves it so much, in fact, that he organizes the theft of a priceless Monet from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In broad daylight.

This complicated sequence, employing excellent copies of masterworks and shot on a very convincing set designed by Bruno Rubeo (real art museums, not surprisingly, do not cooperate with films about stealing paintings), showcases McTiernan's great feel for suspense in enclosed spaces. But with the arrival of insurance investigator Catherine Banning, he falls back on a more leisurely, conversational style that not only emphasizes the growing, forbidden bond between her and Crown, but two other interesting and amusing relationships as well.

Denis Leary plays Michael McCann, the working-class New York detective who's appalled by both the privileges the rich expect and the Europe-based Banning's utter disregard for American police procedures. Still bitter over a long-failed marriage, McCann's also repulsed and stimulated by her willingness to throw her body into the Crown-nailing effort.

The other great, if brief, duet is between Crown and a new character, a sardonic psychiatrist played with provoking relish by none other than Faye Dunaway. In her few short scenes, she tells us more about what's going on with Crown's emotions than Brosnan's entire performance manages to convey.

Whatever his shortcomings, though, Brosnan sure looks the part of an unknowable object of desire. He distinguishes Crown from his similarly sporting James Bond, incrementally but just enough. There's a yearning behind that, um, piercing Irish gaze that no self-respecting superspy would ever reveal.

The real performance here is Russo's, however. Catherine has the biggest conflict and the toughest choices to make, and the relationship's development is seen primarily from her point of view. Russo brings humanizing humor and true ache to an impossible fantasy figure, a feat made no easier in a movie dreamscape of all the beauty wealth can buy.

Or steal.

THE FACTS

The film: ``The Thomas Crown Affair'' (R; sex, nudity, language).

The stars: Pierce Brosnan, Rene Russo, Denis Leary, Faye Dunaway.

Behind the scenes: Directed by John McTiernan. Written by Leslie Dixon, Kurt Wimmer and Alan R. Trustman. Produced by Pierce Brosnan and Beau St. Clair. Released by MGM.

Running time: One hour, 54 minutes.

Playing: Citywide.

Our rating: Three stars.

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Photo

Photo: Rene Russo and Pierce Brosnan in ``The Thomas Crown Affair.''