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Best known for "Last Tango in Paris," Bernardo Ber
moviejunkie
Mar 16, 06
Best known for "Last Tango in Paris," Bernardo Bertolucci once again explores sexuality, this time through a young American's 'First Tango in Paris.' Challenging the NC-17 taboo, Fox Searchlight is releasing this film, uncut, with its graphic sexual content and full frontal nudity.
The story begins as Matthew (Michael Pitt), an collegiate cinephile from California, is befriended by brash Parisian twins who invite him to move into their flat when their parents go on vacation. Once conjoined at the shoulder, Isabelle (Eva Green) and Theo (Louis Garrel) are, psychologically, inseparable. Seductively taunting and teasing Matthew with intimations of incest and homosexuality, they indulge in audaciously wicked - if tiresome - kinky mind games, whilst taking bubble baths together. Perhaps what's most shocking is the reaction of the twins' permissive parents (Robin Renucci, Anna Chancellor) when they unexpectedly return to discover the nude, sleeping trio; they simply write a check to fund more debauchery, then tiptoe out!
Based on Gilbert Adair's adaptation of his novel, this decadent, coming-of-age tale is set in May, 1968, amidst the civil unrest and riots ignited by the dismissal of Henri Langlois as director of the Cinematheque Francaise. And Bertolucci cleverly intercuts classic black-and-white scenes - ranging from Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton to Greta Garbo and Fred Astaire - as dramatic punctuation, fused with Stuart Wilson's resonant soundtrack. With Pitt's androgynous face, Green's voluptuous body and Garrel's sullen demeanor, the actors are perversely convincing. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, "The Dreamers" is a stylish, erotic, sensual 7. Meticulously photographed and crafted, it's a sumptuous visual feast that's built around voyeurism.
