FORK IN THE ROAD

Boy (American filmmaker) meets girl (Irish tinker); boy loses girl; boy finds girl'and a lot of good it does him, or her, or the reader. But they do meet cute. Colin Coyne, 25, is visiting Ireland seeking inspiration. He wants to make a movie about a young filmmaker visiting Ireland seeking . . . well, you get the point. Fade in on him at a hotel bar. Suddenly, he thinks his pocket is being picked. He’s right. Close-up of Gina Furey picking Colin’s pocket, getting caught, screaming rape. The thing about Gina is that while she has the face of an angel, she has the ethical sense of a Fagin. Nevertheless, Colin is smitten down to his midriff. Likewise Gina. As they couple, you can practically hear the rumble of cultures clashing in the background. Wisely, the lovers part. Foolishly, Colin hunts Gina down, and they resume their tempestuous affair, which this time results in a predictable complication nine months later. By that time, Colin’s career is headed toward brilliant: His documentary’s been short-listed for an Oscar, and his feature film’s attracted the financial backing it needs to get made. On the other hand, Gina finds life in America a bore since no-fun Colin has interdicted pick-pocketing. Between bouts of clinically detailed lovemaking, they battle a lot, but the battling is even more automatic than the sex. Whatever poignancy lies in the couple’s mutual awareness of a doomed relationship sinks under layers of indifference, since shallow, self-involved Colin and amoral, foul-mouthed Gina are equally hard to care about whether or not they stay together. New York Daily News columnist Hamill turns from thrillers (Throwing 7‘s, 1999, etc.) to this limp venture into mainstream fiction, but his work retains certain reassuring constants: gratuitous sex, heavy violence, a slapdash style.