Bridges plays Ted Cole, who has earned renown as a writer of children’s books. His marriage to Marion, played with low-key depth by Kim Basinger, is falling apart under the strain that has developed as a result of a tragedy in their lives—the loss of two sons in an auto accident. Their four-year-old daughter Ruth is obsessed with the pictures of the brothers on the walls. Elle Fanning is absolutely gorgeous and haunting in the part.

Ted hires Eddie O’Hare, played by Foster, as a helper for the summer, and Eddie, his teenage hormones on the loose, is turned on by Marion, who tries to take his attentions with a grain of understanding and humor. But she is terribly vulnerable and in need of emotional contact in the context of her pain and doubts about her ability to be a worthy mother. Meanwhile, Ted gets his kicks out of persuading local women to pose nude for him while he paints them, until he tires after they’ve been sufficiently humiliated.

The situation is a summer cauldron, with emotions being kept in restraint but ready to explode. The story develops steamily and candidly. Williams’ screenplay is refreshingly mature, and his direction (his previous film was “The Adventures of Sebastian Cole”) is impeccably right for the material. He recognizes the nuances required and sustains a mood that gets under the skin. Mimi Rogers has a colorful role as Eleanor Vaughn, one of Cole’s abused models, Bijou Phillips is effectively disturbed as Alice, who looks after Ruth, and Louis Arcella is amusing as Eleanor’s gardener. Donna Murphy makes a brief but dandy appearance as the operator of a photo shop.