University Professor Justin Thorne (Jimmy Smits) has got it made. A good-looking, sophisticated teacher, with a loving wife and two adorable children. He plays the saxophone, owns an expensive car and his students love and respect him. But when temptation calls, in the form of one of his bright, pretty, sexy and willing students, Jennifer Carter (Naomi Watts), he foolishly gives in. The next day, he is being charged with her rape, and his perfect life could be forever ruined.
When we see an American actor in Australian film, we know we are not in for a masterpiece. But even viewed with low expectations, "Gross Misconduct" is a huge flop. Based on a play with a rather unimaginative title and then adapted into a reasonably enjoyable book, it fails to engage, convince or even remotely interest its audience on a most fundamental level. The script is awkward and unconvincing; the acting is, for most part, not much better. Watts gives an acceptable performance, demonstrating for one of the first times on screen her emotion rawness, but she is the only good thing about the film, which seems almost like even it can't wait to be over.
The direction is not horrible or distracting in anyway, but it is just painfully mediocre. Apart from the afore-mentioned Naomi Watts, who could be forgiven, seeing as this was early in her career, the acting is wooden and gets steadily worse over the course of the movie. The usually reliable Jimmy Smits doesn't seem to have been trying in this one, and who could really blame him? All these small failures, however, only add to the film's ultimate fatal flaw, which is that the focus is entirely in the wrong place. Any empathy for the characters or interest in the outcome is lost in a sea of what is basically soft-core entertainment of an adult kind. By the end, audiences will probably be bored, tired and wishing they'd done something else with their ninety minutes. Unless you just want to see Naomi get naked 4 or 5 times, you could definitely afford to give this nonevent film a miss.
