CINEMA: IN HIS PRIME

ONCE HOLLYWOOD'S FEISTIEST BAD BOY, SEAN PENN IS NOW A STERN, LOVING DAD. BUT AS SHE'S SO LOVELY PROVES, HE'S STILL A TERRIFIC ACTOR

Eddie Quinn turns to his wife Maureen and warns her against trying to figure him out. "You can't understand my obscurity," he says, "unless you have infrared vision." Actually, Eddie, the flailing loser played by Sean Penn in the new lower-depths romance She's So Lovely, is as easy to read as the funny papers. He loves the mouthy Maureen (Penn's own wife Robin Wright Penn) and will do anything to keep her or get her back. Penn, though, is a more challenging read: Studs Lonigan, say, rewritten by Brando's tougher kid brother.

He is Hollywood's most frighteningly talented pug--Oliver Stone calls...

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