''It's a great festival picture, but on a commercial basis it does not play very well,'' says Larry Gleason, MGM/UA's president of worldwide distribution, adding that on preview-audience response cards, ''the 'definite recommends' were very, very poor.'' Responds García: ''To say that they're cowards for not releasing it is an easy thing to argue.... They are, at the very least, guilty of irresponsible and inept marketing.''
BELIEVE IT OR NOT Wipe the image of Matt Damon out of your mind, take a deep breath, and try to picture Pierce Brosnan as Tom Ripley. (Hey -- as 007, Brosnan does display a sophisticated air and a killer instinct, and he certainly knows his way around Europe.) Fine Line, which owns rights to Patricia Highsmith's ''Ripley's Game'' -- one of the novelist's sequels to ''The Talented Mr. Ripley'' (which Miramax owns) -- is slated to begin production in Italy and Germany this fall, and Brosnan may very well be starring opposite ''M:I-2'''s Dougray Scott (Rupert Everett reportedly considered the costarring role as well). Liliana Cavani (''The Night Porter''), who supervised the script's latest rewrite by Frank Deasy (the upcoming ''Prozac Nation''), will direct.
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