The problem with "The Clearing" has nothing to do with the movie, a suspenseful character study featuring three top-rank actors. The problem arises in the perception of the film as a thriller, a genre in which we have come to expect plenty of action, plot twists and nail-biting tension.

		'The Clearing' Rating: R for brief strong language. Starring: Robert Redford, Helen Mirren, Willem Dafoe. Director: Pieter Jan Brugge.

"The Clearing," set in Pittsburgh and partially shot here (mostly Downtown and in the subway system), contains elements of a thriller, to be sure. Arnold (Willem Dafoe), a disgruntled man who has lost his job, kidnaps Wayne (Robert Redford), a wealthy businessman, and marches him up a hill in the woods toward que sera sera. Wayne's wife, Eileen (Helen Mirren), reports his disappearance, and the FBI shows up to await the ransom demand and coordinate the family's response.

It turns out, however, that the kidnapping is a Maguffin, a plot device, important chiefly as the catalyst for first-time screenwriter Justin Haythe to launch an examination of deeper themes: loss, disappointment and the attempt to rise above them.

The movie sets a deliberate pace, but it keeps moving inexorably forward, alternating between the scenes with Wayne and Arnold in the woods and the scenes with Eileen trying to cope at home. At some point one must recognize an incongruity in the timing of events. But by cutting back and forth as he does, director Pieter Jan Brugge not only heightens the suspense but also opens the way for an examination into the private lives of the characters.

We would expect that Arnold is not happy, not just because he is driven to the extreme of abducting Wayne but also because of the brief glimpse of the small house and the dingy neighborhood in which he lives. The first clue of trouble in the seeming paradise of Wayne and Eileen's comfortable lives comes in the very first scene, when Wayne struggles to wake up in the morning, obviously still tired and with his face's craggy terrain all too evident (Redford shows no vanity in allowing his usually magnificent mug to remind us that he is 66 years old).

For all of the material comfort surrounding Wayne and Eileen, there seems to be no joy in their household. She doesn't seem tired, exactly, but perhaps resigned to the routine in their lives now that they have finally made it to the top.

As the movie progresses, the secrets emerge. Wayne once had an affair with an employee (Wendy Crewson) that continued after Eileen thought she had squelched it. There is a certain distance between Wayne and his adult children. During the journey in the woods, Wayne and Arnold compare and contrast their families and the state of their lives, finding some similarities but also great differences. Their climb up this rugged hill may symbolize an effort to overcome the disillusionment that almost every character in the movie seems to feel.

One may quibble with the ending, which some critics have found anticlimactic, sentimental or simply weak. But no one should be able to argue with the performances in what is definitely an actor's film. As Wayne, Redford exudes authority, even in handcuffs and at gunpoint. Mirren's Eileen has a grim fortitude that allows her to face a crowd of reporters, keep her life running and maintain appearances even when her heart is breaking and when she confronts her husband's mistress or the FBI.

Dafoe provides the real revelation. He has built such a reputation playing creepy, violent villains that the last thing we expect is to see him playing a vulnerable everyman. Arnold feels life has dealt him a bad hand, and most people can relate to that at some point. We understand his motives even if we disagree with his methods. Dafoe, at least in recent years, has seldom seemed so sympathetic.

And when was the last time we got to enjoy three major stars between the ages of 48 and 66 engage us in a thinking man's thriller, even if it is a thriller in structure only?