TV might make cautionary stick figures of Claus and Sunny. Reversal of Fortune treats them as if they were Noel Coward lovers gone to hell in a Lamborghini.

Irons' Von Bulow is easily the most attractive and entertaining movie heavy since James Mason`s villain in North by Northwest, a figure with whom he shares a taste for elegant homes and wry understatement.

Screenwriter Nicholas Kazan, director Barbet Schroeder and, especially, Jeremy Irons--in a glittering performance as the divinely decadent Dane--have chosen to treat this social death spiral as a tragicomedy of manners. It's an inspired tone.

This gripping legal drama is based on a case we still don’t know the truth of — which might make it seem like a pointless exercise, were it not for the fact that it’s infectiously fascinated by greater questions.