This article is from the Aug.26/Sept.2 1994 issue

Embraceable Two:  Crimes' Sisters Moss (left) and Balk unite with deadbeat dad Keitel

IMAGINARY  CRIMES

Staring.  Harvey Keitel, Fairuza balk, Kelly Lynch, Vincent D'Onofrio.

Directed by Anthony Drazan

Until, Keitel singed on in September 1993, this drama about a fast-talking hustler saddled with two daughters after his wife's death languished in development hell. Even with Keitel interested, Interscope abandoned the project. But Morgan Creek decided to gamble on the under-$10 million adaptation of Sheila Ballantyne's semiautobiographical 1982 novel. "I had difficulty figuring out what it would be like to have a dominant father figure because I was raised by my mom," says Gas Food and Lodging's Balk, 20, who plays the emotionally scarred older daughter. "So I told Harvey I needed him to be a father foe me on and off the set." He complied and , "he still is that way,"