AT THE MOVIES - MASKED MEN AND GRINCHES

Reefer Madness

Brenda Blethyn's sense is that public attitudes toward marijuana and other
illegal drugs are just about the same in Britain, where she lives, as in
the United States. But she hopes that not too much emphasis is placed on
the dope-smoking aspects of "Saving Grace," the new comedy in which she
stars as a Cornish housewife persuaded by her gardener to grow and sell pot
as a means of saving her impoverished estate.

"Personally, I believe that it's ridiculous that tobacco and alcohol are
legal but marijuana is not," Ms. Blethyn said while relaxing before an
incongruously raging fire (it was a scorching day outside) in the
air-conditioned lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles. "I don't
condone drug use in any way, but perhaps we ought to think about legalizing
it. I mean, what we're doing now doesn't seem to be working."

The film, which opens on Friday in New York and some other cities, is the
work of the first-time director Nigel Cole and was one of the hits at the
Sundance Film Festival in January. Ms. Blethyn was drawn to it, she said,
by the plight of her character, who suddenly discovers that her husband has
lied to her for decades.

"I did like it," she said. "The idea: to wake up one morning and discover
that 25 years of your life had been a fiction and to suddenly be left
destitute."

Ms. Blethyn is probably best known for her Oscar-nominated role in Mike
Leigh's "Secrets and Lies." While she tends to do most of her work in
independent films, in Britain and America, she said she had no aversion to
working in a big studio film, if the part was right.

At the moment, she is also awaiting the release of "Sleeping Dictionary,"
in which she plays a not altogether sympathetic role as the wife of Bob
Hoskins, marooned in the Sarawak jungles of Borneo. Her memories of that
shoot are vivid, if not altogether pleasant.

"It was fascinating, really," she said. "We had a few snakes turn up, and
iguanas sauntering onto the set. I mean, seven-foot ones. And there were
bugs as big as tennis balls attacking you now and then."

She did an imitation of what it was like to try to shoo away a huge insect
screeching toward her head. A few people in the lobby paused, looked over
with mystification and gradually moved on.