BY TOM GLIATTO
DRAMA
Anne Heche doesn't appear to be a naturally soft actress, but she's a smart, gifted one. If asked to collapse herself into neat, billowing folds like a bolt of chiffon, she'd figure out how to do it. Here, in what looks like Sex and the City relocated to Northern Exposure, she plays a Carrie Bradshaw-esque romance guru named Marin Frist. While en route to a talk in remote Elmo, Alaska, Marin discovers that her fiancé has been cheating. So she decides to leave behind the old life for male-dominated Elmo, where she begins to let go and glow. Unlike Sarah Jessica Parker with her natural relaxed radiance, Heche seems to fumble for an internal switch to turn on that light (you practically hear the relieved little click when she finds it). Give her time, though, and she might shine like the aurora borealis.
