Director Spotlight: Your Friends & Neighbors / Possession / The Shape of Things / Nurse Betty

Your Friends & Neighbors (1998)

From "In the Company of Men" creator Neil LaBute comes this disturbing study of the relationships between the sexes. Drama professor Jerry (Ben Stiller), executive Barry (Aaron Eckhart), gynecologist Cary (Jason Patric), writer Mary (Amy Brenneman), copywriter Terri (Catherine Keener), and art gallery curator Cheri (Nastassja Kinski) are the friends and lovers whose lives dangerously intersect in the bedroom. 101 min. C/Rtg: R

Nurse Betty (2000)

This unpredictable, darkly comic road fantasy from director Neil LaBute centers on Betty Sizemore (Renée Zellweger), a Kansas waitress who becomes delusional after witnessing her husband’s murder and heads to Hollywood to meet a soap opera actor (Greg Kinnear) she believes is a real doctor and her long-lost true love. Trailing her are the hit men (Morgan Freeman and Chris Rock) behind Betty’s hubby’s death. With Crispin Glover, Aaron Eckhart. 110 min. C/Rtg: R

Possession (2002)

Two literary experts--American Roland Michell (Aaron Eckhart) and Brit Maud Bailey (Gwyneth Paltrow)--have forsaken personal lives to pursue their respective research into the lives of two 19th-century English poets, but Roland’s discovery of a love letter linking the writers draws him and Maud together as well. Director/co-scripter Neil LaBute’s unusual romantic odyssey, based on A.S. Byatt’s novel, also stars Jeremy Northam and Jennifer Ehle in flashbacks as the Victorian duo. 103 min. C/Rtg: PG-13

The Shape Of Things (2003)

Adapting his own anti-"Pygmalion" play for the screen, Neil LaBute’s caustic relationship study stars Paul Rudd as Adam, a nerdy college student who begins a relationship with unpredictable art major Evelyn (Rachel Weisz) and introduces her to crass buddy Phillip (Fred Weller) and his fiancée, Jenny (Gretchen Mol). When Evelyn radically makes over Adam’s appearance and life, things heat up between him and Jenny, leading to friction between the four and a surprising revelation. 97 min. C/Rtg: R