Naked Acts

Intelligent and well-meaning, this indie film about a young actress and her complicated relationship with her body is undermined by some dicey acting and an tendency to didacticism. Estranged from her mother -- a Pam Grier-like blaxplotation star named Lydia Love (Patricia DeArcy) -- newly-svelte Cece (Jake-ann Jones) wants to be an actress, but not like Lydia. She hopes instead to emulate her grandmother (Maranantha Quick), who passed on to Cece her firm belief that theater arts should be uplifting and moral rather than trashy and exploitative. She scores a featured role in a pretentious indie movie called "Body of Art," about a painter and his relationship with ...