By Rex Reed

June 17, 2001 | 8:00 p.m

From Gandhi to

Gangster For a diverting, pulse-quickening antidote to the summer-trash explosion at the movies, check out Sexy Beast , a noirish psychological crime thriller that kicks the familiar genre of British gangster flicks up a notch. Follically challenged Oscar-winner Ben Kingsley is famous for playing saints, but after his terrifying performance as a violent, racist, homophobic Cockney thug, it will be difficult to ever think of him as Gandhi again. In this debut feature by British director Jonathan Glazer, two diametrically opposite underworld criminals go head-to-head in a battle of wills and nerves that will leave you gasping. Mr. Kingsley is Don Logan, a repulsive sewer rat who has been dispatched to the Costa del Sol by a gay London crime lord (Ian McShane) to fetch a retired thief named Gal Dove for one last heist masterminded by a corrupt bank president (James Fox). But Gal (played by the great Ray Winstone) does not want to be fetched. He's served his time behind bars and just wants to be left alone to enjoy the luxury of his retirement in Spain with the wife he adores, a former porno star who has also packed in her past (distinguished stage actress Amanda Redman). But Don is a diabolical cretin who won't take "no" for an answer. The result is an explosive clash that examines, with cutting-edge realism, two different kinds of mobster played by two different kinds of actor. Mr. Winstone, who played the detestable, abusive father in Gary Oldman's independent feature Nil by Mouth , is a bloated, paunchy, high-living beached sperm whale who has intentionally gone to seed, fond of lush music, sausages on the barbie and cocktails by the pool. Mr. Kingsley is a satanic-looking killer: hard, bald, lean and tight-lipped, with cruelty playing around the corners of his mouth. He's a piece of work-bullying men, torturing women with sexual innuendo, wreaking havoc on an airplane with a lighted cigarette, erupting into fits of savage rage when provoked. As soon as Gal and his party guests think they've sent him away, Don returns to terrorize everyone in Gal's villa in an agitated state that builds to a ghastly climax. In a series of gruesome surprises, it takes two women, two men and a small boy to finish him off. After Gal disposes of the corpse, he also has to pull the job in London and outsmart an equally lethal adversary before he can return to the good life in bliss. In one of the most imaginatively directed and photographed sequences in film, Don's bloody murder is intercut with the sensational underwater heist as the gang robs the bank from under a Turkish bath. In contrast to the dreary, navy-blue London rain, the finale once again shifts to the sunny coast of Spain, fresh martinis and resumed tranquillity. But can it last? Keep an eye on that swimming pool. Although Sexy Beast reminds some viewers of Reservoir Dogs , it's more like Quentin Tarantino's film in reverse; instead of the aftermath of a heist, it's a heist movie about all the events leading up to it. A sparse but meaty script trimmed of all superfluous fat, structured and confident direction, and superbly tense performances by the entire cast help to elevate Sexy Beast above its gangster roots. But it is really Ben Kingsley who shocks it into a dark, exciting, energetic life of its own. It's a study in serpentine sang-froid, and the actor-born Krishna Banji to a British mother and an Asian father from Kenya-has just the odd, genetic mixture of piercing strangeness and intense ferocity to make the role of a satanic-looking hood doubly scary. Equally convincing playing monsters (Meyer Lansky in Bugsy ) or martyrs ( Ghandi , Itzhak Stern in Schindler's List ), Mr. Kingsley is the consummate artist. But in Sexy Beast , his beady, focused eyes, reptilian coldness and poisonous killer instinct are the closest the movies have ever come to a human cobra. There's Music in Them Thar Hills The formidable British actress Janet McTeer is the inspired centerpiece of Songcatcher , an unusual film of texture and quality that combines the disciplined, high-minded structure of a Merchant-Ivory period piece with the opulent, teary-eyed melodramatics of a Sunday-night Hallmark Hall of Fame special. Ms. McTeer plays Dr. Lily Penleric, a prim, proper, turn-of-the-century music professor who is continually passed over for promotion in the halls of academe because she's a woman. Disappointed, exasperated and fed up, she chucks her job as a musicologist and moves to a remote mountain village in North Carolina to research the primitive roots of Appalachian folk songs. In the rural bluegrass country, she joins her spinster sister Elna (Jane Adams), a schoolteacher who is already familiar with the strange ways of the mountain people-but Lily learns the hard way. Hostile, suspicious, potentially dangerous, these hillbillies lead hardscrabble lives and do not welcome outsiders. In time, Lily develops respect for their hardened traditions and falls in love with the country songs they've passed down from generation to generation. Discovering, collecting, preserving and cataloguing this musical heritage for a songbook is her goal, and in time she becomes a trusted member of the community and even falls in love with a moonshiner (Aidan Quinn). The film does a fine job of explaining these odd, reclusive, clannish people-dirt poor, their land depleted and their crops failing, with nothing left but their music, encroached on by intruders who want to exploit them for everything from their patchwork quilts to their coal mines. Music is their literature, their legacy, their culture. The film also does a fascinating job of building a mosaic of that culture, authentically utilizing everything from corncob pipes and schoolhouse quilts to log cabins and twig furniture. (The sets look like a Ralph Lauren showroom.) But just when you're beginning to share Lily's respect for and admiration of Appalachian strength and pride, her sister is discovered having a lesbian affair with another schoolmarm, and hell pierces the reverie. Fueled by fear, prejudice, homophobia and Christian hysteria, the rednecks burn the school, destroy Lily's work and research, and that's not all. The melodrama piles up thick as blackstrap molasses. Still, it's a revealing and educational film, the cinematography is breathtaking, there is haunting music in every moon ray and sunrise of this part of lost Americana, and the distinguished performance by Janet McTeer really makes it sing. Carefully written and meticulously directed by the talented Maggie Greenwald, Songcatcher lulled and transported me in time and tempo, like movements in a symphony, which is what memorable movies are supposed to do. In the avalanche of summer trash, I don't have to tell you where to find Pearl Harbor . You may have to search for Songcatcher . If you do, I promise you'll find it a richer, more rewarding experience. Planet of the Amphibians Ivan Reitman's zany Evolution provides the currently deplorable state of Hollywood comedy with a welcome lift. With this wacky sci-fi crowd-pleaser, the director of Ghostbusters delivers an assault on the funny bone so goofy that I found myself laughing in spite of myself. A big rock that looks like a humongous, flaming Baby Ruth hurtles toward Earth, and when it crashes the computer nudniks and animatronic puppeteers have a field day. Worms containing DNA don't stay worms for long. They multiply so fast that the equivalent of 200 million years of evolution copies in two days. Preppie X-Files defector David Duchovny and bug-eyed comic Orlando Jones are the Martin and Lewis of the scenario-two science teachers from an Arizona community college who fight for their right to conduct experiments at the crash site with their idiot high-school-dropout sidekick (Seann William Scott, from American Pie ). But the villainous U.S. military (all nitwits in uniform, natch!) wreck their hopes for a Nobel Prize by sealing off the area. Then the creatures start adapting and the special-effects department goes wild, turning mugwumps and newts into all sorts of mind-boggling Jurassic Park monsters that steal the show. Crocodiles are crossed with pit bulls. A caterpillar grows into a muskrat with the tongue of a dinosaur. A flesh-eating raptor attacks a shopping mall. If the numbnuts don't act fast, America will be toast. The Army, with typical Hollywood nincompoopery, plans to wipe out the menace with napalm, but the heat turns the aliens into a gigantic mountain of gory ooze. The heroes know the secret: The only thing that can kill the Blob is Head & Shoulders shampoo! Julianne Moore, on vacation from her usual serious roles, joins in as a klutzy research scientist, and Dan Aykroyd plays the moronic governor of Arizona with great relish, but it's the special-effects monsters you should keep your eyes on. There's a gross-out finale in an alien rectum the size of the Grand Canyon that has to be seen to be believed, but it's funny because the silliness stems from real wit instead of broad, stupid kindergarten gags. Mr. Reitman has directed his share of fine comedies ( Dave ) and stinkers ( Junior ), but he's in top form here. Evolution is the kind of dope-fest I usually hate, but this one made me laugh myself silly. This is very high praise indeed.