Jack Moore -- sophisticatedly bemused and attractive, a bit world-weary around his Armani frames, and ennobled by sadness (his wife and small daughter had been killed in an automobile accident several years before) -- is a role Gere has needed for some time. The actor has a limited range. Admirably, he has tried to stretch it; some of the results have been less than salutary. Gere is so distinctively a contemporary persona -- in his vocal expression, his physical carriage, even his repertory of facial expressions -- that his forays into historical drama have been among his least successful. (Remember King David and Sommersby?) Red Corner is tailor-made to Gere's strengths and allows as well a little room for growth. As he proved as far back as American Gigolo, Gere is a New Age sex symbol -- strong but gentle, respectful of women, politically liberal, soft-spoken, in possession of a mischievous smile, which he lets out on a leash almost self-deprecatingly but to no less compelling effect. In Red Corner, Moore's background and his current dilemma allow Gere to play his gentle masculinity card while simultaneously fighting for personal conscience and international justice. It's a strong performance, both thoughtful and juicy, and he is partnered beautifully by Ling in her American film debut. There is only one grating mistake on Avnet's part, a momentary relapse into "Up Close and Personal-itis": when Moore, having finally managed to escape to the safe haven of the U.S. Embassy, turns himself back over to the Chinese authorities because Ling's character has put her entire career on the line in his defense, we are inundated by some pompously architectonic camera work and a bathetic swell of Thomas Newman's soundtrack music. (The plot-line development takes a big enough tug on the viewer's suspension of disbelief without drawing such heraldic attention to it.)