neumu [ cinematronic ]




	The Dreamers
	Bernardo Bertolucci Michael Pitt, Louis Garrel, Eva Green, Robin Renucci, Anna Chancellor 2003		While not in the same league as his stunning earlier films "The Conformist" and "The Last Emperor," "The Dreamers" is director Bernardo Bertolucci's return to the provocative, romantic themes he explored in 1996's "Stealing Beauty." The latter was a meditation on mortality and the heady delirium of awakening sexuality. "The Dreamers," detailing a youthful mènage á trois in 1968 Paris, is a tad more ambitious and a little less successful as it attempts to blend its characters' budding eroticism and passion for the cinema in the context of the cultural and political revolutions of the era. As student riots rage in the streets, androgynously attractive American college boy Matthew (Michael Pitt) falls in with fellow cinephiles: lovely, seductive Isabelle (Eva Green) and her possessive brother Theo (Louis Garrel). The siblings' parents are on vacation, and Matthew is invited to stay at the family's apartment. There, the trio indulges in role-playing and film trivia contests (illustrated by vintage clips), which lead to sex games and a deeper bond. But their bliss is undermined by jealousy and threatened by the unrest outside their door. The lissome threesome wavers between callow and pretentious, but Bertolucci's take on them and their milieu can be invigorating. A whiff of incest and full frontal nudity must be why the film earned its NC-17 rating — undeservedly.