Appreciation: Anne Heche was an extraordinary actor. The movies never really figured her out
One of Anne Heche's greatest performances can be found in "Birth" (2004), Jonathan Glazer's magnificently eerie drama about love, grief and the insidious power of suggestion. She enters the movie early, with long brown hair — a departure from the short blond cuts that had become a signature look — and a face that looks more tightly drawn, more sharply angled than usual. Her character, Clara, is cool and reserved, someone you might not immediately notice in a roomful of other demure, beige-coated Manhattanites. But then you catch her gaze, and Heche shows you a silent, unnerving glimpse of who Clara is: a bereaved lover, a glaring rival, a determined and vindictive agent of chaos.
It's not immediately clear what connection Clara has to this puzzler of a story, about a woman (Nicole Kidman) whose life is rocked by the
