Short Takes

CINEMA

Dirty Harriet Makes Her Day

THERE'S PERHAPS NO POINT TO POINT OF NO RETURN. It's a remake of an unimprovably stylish, very entertaining thriller -- La Femme Nikita -- that was released just two years ago. But hey, that was in French. Why not let people who hate subtitles in on the fun? Bridget Fonda is a sort of Dirty Harriet, a reprieved murderer turned into an elegant assassin by a mysterious government agency. She and her handler (Gabriel Byrne) fall into unconsummated love. She sublimates with gunplay while growing wistful for normality. John Badham's film seems to have more firepower and slightly softer edges than the original. But the possibly liberating subtext, that a woman is entitled to be sexy and violent just like a male action star, is intact -- and well played by Fonda.

TELEVISION

Ditso from the Start

HEDDA GABLER, A FIERCELY INDEPENdent woman trapped in bourgeois-marriage hell, keeps a set of pistols around the house, and it's only a matter of time before one goes off. The tragedy may be inevitable, but a new MASTERPIECE THEATRE production of Ibsen's classic play (PBS, March 28) is possibly the first to make it seem like a blessed relief. Fiona Shaw's self-absorbed, unsympathetic portrayal makes Hedda ditso from the start: darting, distracted gestures, nervous facial tics and a voice that drops to an inaudible whisper about every third line. Stephen Rea (The Crying Game) is more engaging as the dissolute scholar who once loved her, but Deborah Warner's dark, eccentric production defeats him too.

MUSIC

Changing Horses

WHAT'S HAPPENED TO THE GLAMOROUS young German violinist ANNE-SOPHIE MUTTER? She used to be just another pretty face, riding to glory aboard great war- horses named Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Brahms. On her latest Deutsche Grammophon album, though, she harnesses two modern violin concertos and tames them both. In Alban Berg's ineffable 1935 two-movement concerto, a requiem for the daughter of Alma Mahler Gropius, Mutter evokes the music's intense, passionate suffering. In Wolfgang Rihm's gorgeous Time Chant, written for her last year, Mutter's splendid fiddle soars ethereally over the Chicago Symphony led by James Levine. Can it be that, as the millennium dawns, 20th century music is not so tough after all?

MUSIC

Heroes at a Hootenanny

IT IS NOT AS THOUGH NANCI GRIFFITH ever forsook her folk roots. She was just worried that others would forget, and that her younger fans might never know. So, with Other Voices, Other Rooms, she pays homage to her heroes, those folk stars who sang to her from her bedside radio when she was a Texas teenager. Some of her honorees even come to the party. Bob Dylan plays harmonica on his almost forgotten Boots of Spanish Leather. John Prine sings harmony on his Speed of the Sound of Loneliness. Arlo Guthrie sings on Tecumseh Valley, by Townes Van Zandt, though not on his father Woody's Do Re Mi. Griffith blends her voice with these and others to bring something new to the old songs and make them young again.

BOOKS

Impossible Choices

MODERN MEDICINE CAN KEEP PEOPLE alive longer or make them die slower. But how exactly does anyone decide when the line between the two has been crossed? When do the medical marvels turn into miseries for the critically ill? In FIRST, DO NO HARM (Simon & Schuster; $23), Lisa Belkin vividly chronicles the painful, draining struggles of patients, families and staff at Houston's Hermann Hospital as they choose to continue or halt aggressive treatment. Belkin, a reporter for the New York Times, has an exceptional eye for detail and tells her tales with a rare blend of clarity and compassion. Her book more than meets the second part of Hippocrates' directive: do good.