“Molly.” Directed by John Duigan. Written by Dick Christie. Running time: 103 minutes. Rated PG-13.

With clear echoes of Daniel Keyes’ novel “Flowers of Algernon” and the Academy Award-winning 1968 film “Charly,” on which “Flowers” is based, John Duigan’s “Molly” follows an autistic woman (Elizabeth Shue) who is able to function normally after undergoing a risky scientific procedure.

The film, which also recalls “Awakenings,” “Rain Man” and “The Other Sister,” would have been thin without Shue, whose affecting performance as Molly is much stronger than the material she’s been given to work with. Indeed, it is Shue, the Academy Award-nominated actress of “Leaving Las Vegas,” who gives “Molly” the big heart it has.

The film opens with Molly being released from a nursing home in the care of her brother, Buck (Aaron Eckhart), an advertising executive who, for reasons that are never made sufficiently clear, is forced to take Molly in. We learn that their parents died together at a relatively young age, but we never learn how, another oversight in a film that’s undermined by just this sort of careless writing and editing.

Still, Duigan has Shue, a strong actress who strikes just the right tone in a film that becomes increasingly moving and poignant as it considers what the word “normal” means to each of us. It is this central question, and Shue’s performance, that gives the film substance.

Grade: B

“Three to Tango.” Directed by Damon Santostefano. Written by Rodney Vaccaro and Aline Brosh McKenna. Running time: 98 minutes. Rated PG-13.

Not to step on anyone’s toes, but Damon Santostefano’s “Three to Tango” cuts one hell of a stupid rug.

The film is a ridiculous bit of unfunny fluff in which the jokes have been hauled out of the closet so many times, it’s almost unbearable to find them dusted off once again for another go around the box office. Still, here they are, clinking and clanking and dragging their sorry way into a thin plot about sexual misidentity.

The film stars Matthew Perry as Oscar Novak, a straight Chicago architect who is mistaken for a gay man, which Oscar finds absolutely unbearable. He’s just greedy enough to put up with it, though. Along with his gay architectural partner, Peter (Oliver Pratt), Oscar is vying for a $90 million commission from Charles Newman (Dylan McDermott), a wealthy Chicago builder who is so convinced Oscar is gay, he enlists his help in spying on his mistress, Amy (Neve Campbell), a bohemian artist with scores of ex-boyfriends.

The thinking behind this? Charles, rather brilliantly, doesn’t believe Oscar will be any threat to his relationship with Amy.

In a film that oddly comes stamped with the approval of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, “Three to Tango” probably won’t anger audiences or the gay community with its clear mean streak and stereotypical depiction of gay men. In the end, it’s too dumb for that — and won’t be around long enough for anyone to really care.

Grade: D-

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear each Monday and Thursday in the NEWS, each Tuesday and Thursday on WLBZ’s “News Center 5:30 Today” and “News Center Tonight,” and each Saturday and Sunday on WCSH-TV’s statewide “Morning Report.”