`Bridges’ a washout due to flood of mush

On my way out of the movie theater after seeing “The Bridges of Madison County,” I overheard a man say: “All the women are crying. All the men are quiet and shaking their heads. Yep, it must have been a good film.”

Well, nope. He was wrong.

Oh, the women sure were crying. Some even took boxes of tissues into the theater with them.

And the men were quiet all right. Pensive even.

But the film?

I wish I could get past my editor by just writing “ugh.”

That’s how I felt about the book. That’s how I felt about the movie.

The film re-creates Robert James Waller’s megahit story of National Geographic photographer Robert Kincaid, who gets lost in the front yard of unfulfilled Iowan housewife Francesca Johnson. Francesca’s husband and two children have taken a prize steer to the Iowa State Fair and are gone for four days. During that time, Robert and Francesca fall in love and have an affair that makes them realize that all the experiences of their lives had been leading right to this moment.

“This kind of certainty comes but once in a lifetime,” says Robert.

For me, these were the longest four days in cinematographic history.

I dunno. Maybe you have to be more mature than I am to understand this story. Maybe you have to spend your life never getting what you want.

But it’s like Francesca says: “The mystery is pure and absolute.” She is talking about love. I’m talking about how popular I just know this film is going to be.

Critics laud director Clint Eastwood for his laconic and sensitive style. And he does take it slow through the inner and outer landscapes of the tale. So slow, in fact, that it probably takes less time to read the 170-page book than to watch the 135-minute film. Although Eastwood is faithful to Waller’s literary mood, he tweaks the story so that it really is less about Robert than about Francesca, an Italian-born war bride stuck in the heartland and suffering from the ennui of an underfertilized passion for life. The story is told as a flashback after her two grown children find their late mother’s journals and learn about the affair.

The role is perfect for drama diva Meryl Streep, who stars as Francesca. And star she does. Eastwood has essentially given this film to Streep, who is at her method-acting best with a collage of ticks and tricks. She scrunches her lips, picks at her ears, flips a strand of hair, shoos away flies (of which there are, apparently, many in Iowa). In some camera shots, she even has two moles on her right cheek — presumably to give her that real Italian look which knocks Robert to his knees.

Streep’s real love affair is with the camera, however. And if you’ve seen “Sophie’s Choice,” you’ve already seen most of Streep’s schtick in “Bridges.”

What is great about Streep’s performance is that she successfully stretches the definition of “beautiful” to (finally!) include middle-aged women. Plus, she often gives a good comedic punch to many of her lines. For instance, when Robert asks Francesca to describe her husband, Streep says thoughtfully, “He’s clean.”

As Robert, Eastwood never really stops being a caricature of himself. After building a career on snarling across the high plains and growling such one-liners as “Go ahead. Make my day,” it’s a little strange seeing him as a sensitive Marlboro Man saying through gritted teeth: “I don’t want to need you if I can’t have you.”

The film, I am told by experts, is about recognizing the place of romance in our lives, about women choosing the good and noble (their spoiled rotten, unappreciative, unimaginative families?) rather than the daring and desirous (life on the road with a guy who helps make dinner and recites second-rate insights?). Wow. What choices.

To me this is a film about dreaming. As in, “You’re dreaming if you think mysterious, elusive men have any lasting value” and “You’re dreaming if you think that `Bridges’ actually has any profundity beyond a Hallmark greeting.”

The best part of this film is the wallpaper in the old farmhouse and the gauzy portrait of midland-American life in 1965.

Still, it’s sure to be the weeper of the summer. Even the book remains popular — with 147 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list.

For that I can issue a final “ugh.”