Adrien Brody owns Love the Hard Way. While it’s based on a Japanese novel, Peter Sehr’s drama about petty crooks has a distinct R & B flavor (witness the soundtrack). In fact, it wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say it easily could have been a vehicle for any number of black actors (Omar Epps, Morris Chestnut). But it was pre-Pianist Brody who walked away with the lead, and as unlikely as he would seem to play a street-wise hood, he’s damn good. Sehr and co-writer Marie Noelle’s adaptation revolves around a trio of low-rent New York criminals: Jack (Brody), Charlie (Jon Seda) and a German hotel manager named Jeff (August Deal). They appear to have a good scam going. Two paid female acquaintances act as hookers at Jeff’s hotel, luring foreign businessmen into compromising positions, only to have their merrymaking cut short by the appearance of two men in blue — Jack and Charlie dressed in (presumably) stolen police uniforms. With the businessmen’s mouths agape, the phony cops make off with their cash, jewelry and even a few shopping bags full of Fifth Avenue goodies. Jack thinks of himself as a ladies man — he boasts he’s slept with more than 200 women — but he has much to learn about love. When he meets Claire (fetching Charlotte Ryanna), a brainy college student majoring in biology, all signs would point to her as his teacher. But while she has the book smarts, she lacks street smarts. She’s so intrigued by Jack, so convinced there is something good and decent beneath his “screw everything” exterior, that he becomes the ultimate bad influence. “The world is full of fallen angels,” a friend tells Claire, hoping to wise her up to the trouble she is getting into.

Aside from the sheer implausibility of Jack and his cronies repeating an identical crime over and over in the same hotel, Claire and Jack’s love story is Love the Hard Way’s biggest stumbling block. Brody and Ryanna have excellent chemistry, and Sehr and Noelle attempt to logically explain why an overachieving, inexperienced young woman would want to “save” a small-time hood from himself (“I just can’t wait to get to the real stuff,” she coos after a night of wild sex with Jacky boy). But their relationship still seems far-fetched, even absurd. Ah, but there is Brody to take our minds off the shrill plot turns. Wearing a gaudy snakeskin jacket as if it were a second skin, his hair seemingly styled with an egg-beater, Brody tugs on a series of cigarettes with the authority of Bogart. You wouldn’t expect an actor with sunken eyes, a misshapen nose and an emaciated frame to be able to pull off a performance requiring him to walk tough, talk tough and reek of sex, but, amazingly, Brody does it all — with style. Don’t miss: Whale Rider, written and directed by New Zealand filmmaker Niki Caro, from Witi Ihimaera’s book of the same name. Though I recoil at the notion of “family” films (like the insultingly predictable, anti-lesbian Bend It Like Beckham), this is a movie truly worthy of that label, a female empowerment story (written in novel form by a man, directed by a woman) to be treasured — and not just by young girls. A young Maori girl’s birth seems to bring nothing but misery to her grandfather (he was counting on a boy), leading him to refuse Pai entrance into a school designed to bring forth a male leader. But the plucky lass is determined to be treated as an equal, and with the help of a loving grandmother (a luminous Vicky Haughton) and uncle shows her crusty, old-school granddad (Rawiri Paratene) that his long-cherished beliefs are out of step with a changing world. “If the knowledge is given to everyone, we can have lots of leaders,” Pai says. (Right on, sister.) The entire cast is exemplary, but it is the fresh, beautifully natural performance by then-11-year-old newcomer Keisha Castle-Hughes that puts a lump in your throat. If special “juvenile” Oscars can be given to Bobby Driscoll and Shirley Temple, then this promising young talent should be awarded her own statuette at next year’s ceremony. Love the Hard Way plays one week only, June 20-26, at Landmark’s Ken Cinema. For show times, call (619) 283-5909. Whale Rider starts today at Landmark’s Hillcrest Cinema. Call (619) 299-2100.

— Kyle Counts is the film critic for the Gay and Lesbian Times