In Search of Gregory

Julie Christie plays a single, uninhibited lass who travels from Rome to Geneva for the sixth wedding of her wealthy father, who has promised she will meet a dashing, unattached American named Gregory at the ceremony. Trivial vehicle for then-hot property Christie seems to be about romantic delusion and disappointment, but it never gets out of first gear. Christie's flirtatious relationship with her brother (a very green John Hurt) is certainly curious--he appears to be both homosexual and housebound--but Michael Sarrazin is less enigmatic as he is misplaced in this wispy world of lost lovers. Director Peter Wood has an eye for character detail, but no filmmaker could do much with Tonino Guerra and Lucile Laks' exceptionally mild screenplay. *1/2 from ****