A gay-pride parade and street scene in the second act is supported with stiltedly festive music.

As in the director Francis Veber's last film, "The Dinner Game," one absurd lie begets another, and before long, the straight antiheroic milquetoast finds himself riding a float in a gay-pride parade and wearing a condom cap.

But the mayor suffered a setback in July during the World Pride Roma 2000 festival, when he first embraced a gay-pride parade through Rome, then distanced himself from it after the Vatican complained.

Mr. Ryan, also a moderate, supports gun controls and recently participated prominently in a gay-pride parade.

Half a year after taking over in 1994, he upset some officers when he wore his uniform in a gay-pride parade but forbade his officers from wearing theirs at a "March for Jesus" the same weekend.

He has admitted to forwarding e-mails depicting bestiality and recounting racist jokes that some people find as disgusting as he finds gay-pride parades.

Perhaps if you deploy all your rhetorical powers, he'll be doing free repairs on the floats at next year's gay-pride parade.