MCCORMICK'S QUICK TAKES ON STRONG WOMEN IN MOVIES.

Chocolat (Miramax, 2000). Fans of Babette's Feast and Ballroom Dancing will find a lot to like in this luscious morsel of a film about two magical and rebellious pilgrims who arrive in a very provincial French village at the start of Lent

But instead of bearing ashes or sackcloth, the decidedly nonsomber Vianne Rocher (Juliette Binoche) and her daughter entice townsfolk with a wide range of forbidden chocolates, each delicate confection designed to cure a particular customer's ailment

Greeted at first with fear and trepidation, the insurrectionists are soon embraced by a growing tide of citizens, ultimately provoking the wrath of the mayor and his cronies. Fortunately, this is a Lenten tale that ends with an Easter feast. *** 1/2

You Can Count on Me (Paramount Classics, 2000). Samantha Prescott (Laura Linney) may well be a woman on the edge of a nervous breakdown--or indeed, two women on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

On the surface, Sammy--a loan officer at the local bank and the in-charge and slightly unbending (but Iov. lng) mom of an 8-year-old boy--seems like a person in command of every aspect of her life. But when her out-of control brother drops into town, her commitment-phobic boyfriend proposes marriage, and her fussbudget boss (Matthew Broderick) takes her to bed, Sammy starts to fray around the edges.

Soon she's balancing Broderick and the boyfriend, trying to parent a son and a brother--and hoping to hold everything together without falling apart. Not a movie with a lot of answers, but it certainly poses some interesting questions.*****

All About Eve (20th Century Fox, 1950). Joseph Mankiewicz's classic tale of ambition and betrayal is chock full of sparkling dialogue and a sizzling cast

Broadway star Margo Channing (Bette Davis) is at the crest of a brilliant career when poor little Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter) shows up at the stage door, begging for an autograph and an audience. Soon Harrington has wormed her way into Channing's home, career, and friends--scheming and maneuvering to displace the aging star.

The ingenious (but hardly ingenuous) ingenue manages to win, but the often-irascible Channing ends up with all the friends. *****

Out of Africa (Universal Pictures, 1985). In Sydney Pollack's lavish and gorgeously photographed romance epic, Meryl Streep plays the part of Baroness Karen Blixen, an extraordinary woman who has come to Kenya from Denmark married to a man she does not love and a farm no one thinks she can run.

While she wrestles with a collapsing marriage, failed crops, and a decidedly unwelcoming group of British colonials, the undaunted Blixen comes across an English hunter (played by Robert Redford) who might just be her match, if only he can find it in himself to embrace a partner of such substance and character.

Along the way, Blixen finds a voice that's as lush and rich as her East African home, a voice that will eventually become the real-life novelist Isak Dinesen. *****