Entertainment

SEX, DRUGS & TEDIUM

IF anything can kill America’s long-running love affair with the ’80s, it may be Gregor Jordan’s “The Informers,” a tedious and tawdry adaptation from that decade’s self-proclaimed poet laureate, Bret Easton Ellis (“Less Than Zero”).

Sort of a brain-dead “Short Cuts,” this risible film follows an interchangeable collection of empty-headed blonds (of both sexes) who hop from bed to bed and from drug to drug.

A pointless accidental death launches the aimless narrative, which is specifically set in 1984. We know this because a televised clip of Ronald Reagan is followed by one of many scenes of a couple fornicating.

There are men and women, men and men, threesomes and foursomes, and underage teens of both sexes who wake up in the bed of a blitzed-out rock star (Mel Raido) who understandably has been denied visitation with his son.

If the film had a center, it would probably be self-pitying Graham (Jon Foster, even more of a cipher than in “The Mysteries of Pittsburgh”), son of sleazy movie producer William (Billy Bob Thornton).

William is having an affair with TV anchor Cheryl (Winona Ryder) but wants to get back with his estranged wife, Graham’s mom Laura (Kim Basinger), to avoid giving her half his assets in a divorce.

Graham and his sister numb themselves to their ennui with frequent ingestion of drugs and by having sex (separately) with Martin (Austin Nichols), who is also servicing Laura on the side.

If you think that’s sleazy, consider what passes for the movie’s comic subplot.

Representing the other end of La La Land’s socioeconomic scale, Peter (Mickey Rourke) kidnaps a youngster and plans to sell him to a pedophile ring with the help of Jack (the late, unfortunate, Brad Renfro).

By comparison, the efforts of Les (Chris Isaak) to hook up him and his disgusted son Tim (Lou Pucci Taylor) with underage hotties in Hawaii seems positively wholesome.

“The Informers” is a movie so seamy it makes you want to take a bath afterward. Rarely has so much sin seemed so boring.

THE INFORMERS

Zero stars Actually, less than zero.

Running time: 109 minutes. Rated R (sex, nudity, profanity, child abuse). At the Empire, the Chelsea, the Angelika, others.