WHAT IS TRUTH? How does any person balance the conflicting values of truth and privacy? Must truth always be the whole truth? Where can one draw the line between truth and mere adherence to the facts?

Absence of Malice is a slick, commercial movie that determinedly hammers away at these questions in the context of journalistic responsibility. In its desperate attempt to condense answers to insoluble problems into pithy, easily understandable maxims, the film subordinates characters and plot to an almighty Message, and the film becomes undramatic and uninteresting.

The scrupulously tidy plot concerns Meghan Carter (Sally Field), a 34-year-old bungling reporter who is handed a story by the head of an FBI task force out to break Miami's organized crime ring in any way he can. Meghan obligingly reports the story, implicating honest longshoreman Mike Gallagher (Paul Newman) in a Jimmy Hoffa-esque murder. As she presses further, Meghan is fed stories by Gallagher's childhood buddy Teresa (Melinda Dillon) and eventually by Gallagher himself, each of which she prints in an ostensible effort to be fair. The point is clear enough: Each story Meghan writes is accurate as far as it goes, but because each contains only a small piece of the overall picture, the truth is inevitably distorted, with nearly disastrous results.

Kurt Luedtke, who wrote the screenplay--his first--spent most of his professional life as a journalist and editor. His awkwardness in the film medium becomes evident in the consistent heavy-handedness of the screenplay. Rather than emerging naturally out of situations, the irony hits the audience relentlessly, pounded in by sledgehammer lines wielded in close-up shots. "Things aren't always what they seem," Gallagher informs Meghan in a flash of inspiration. And in another exchange, a fellow reporter asks Meghan to describe her relationship with Gallagher. "Involved," she says. "Is that true?" the colleague asks. "No, but it's accurate," Get it?

Sally Field prances through the movie in high heels and custom-tailored suits, more concerned with keeping her hair in place than covering all the bases on a story. Her strained toughness-she addresses her "prey" as Gallagher even after her interest in him becomes more than professional--clashes oddly with her naivete, evidenced every time she puts her pert nose to a hot tip. As she stands in her high-tech kitchen blinking longingly at Gallagher, we may believe many things about her. That she is a newspaper reporter is, unfortunately, not one of them.

Newman has greater success with his portrayal of Gallagher, somehow creating a believable, sympathetic character out of a tough-but-sensitive, intelligent longshoreman, the honest son of a Mafia biggie. Blue eyes flashing, he powers the otherwise insipid film through the inevitable plot twists and romantic interludes. If he is unable to give the movie a focus, at least he gives us something to watch.

The supporting cast, especially Bob Balaban as Rosen, the corrupt FBI man, and Josef Sommer as McAdam, the understanding editor, does a good job and occasionally manages to shake the movie from its plodding, moralistic path. But all the actors are shackled by lines that support the film's message, rather than coherent characterizations. Having published a story that leads to a suicide, Meghan and McAdam sit in the newsroom and discuss the extent of their responsibility for the tragedy. "And if you delete newspaper?" Meghan bitterly replies. The exchange is glib, cute--and totally out of place.

The film's formulaic approach precludes adequate treatment of any deeper issues: the need to be sensational in order to sell papers; the importance of a broad interpretation of the First Amendment, even with the danger that the power of free speech will occasionally be misused; the protection of journalistic sources versus protection of the public. Designed solely to pit the ordinary guy against the villains of organized power, both journalists and government bureaucrats, the movie discards any subtlety that might undermine the clarity of the message.

Ultimately, Absence of Malice collapses under its own weight, becoming simplistic to the point of irrelevance. No amount of good intentions can save a screenplay determined to make the same point at every turn--and that is both accurate and the truth.