The Dreamers - Revolutionary Cinema

my rating:

The Dreamers is a film about cinéastes, for cinéastes. About revolutionaries for revolutionaries as well. And perverts, let's not forget the perverts.

And I mean that in a nice way. {smile}

It's a movie about three young students in the riotous Paris of 1968. One is Matthew, an American enthralled with the revolutionary cinema he discovers while studying French abroad. The other are a twin sister and brother, who not only share a birthday but also a very casual intimacy. Theo and Isabelle take a liking to Matthew and invite him to stay with them. Despite some uneasiness, Matthew becomes part of their world, in the process acting as a catalyst to change it.

Let's deal with the perversity first: This movie tackles a few sexual taboos, and does so largely without flinching. There's the relationship between the two siblings, which is incestuous by any reasonable standard, and arguably unhealthy (that's certainly Matthew's take on it), but not the one-dimensional treatment it usually gets in the movies (or any other mainstream fiction) where it's defined as equivalent to rape. There's also the voyeurist/exhibitionist aspect which has been an element of Isabelle and Theo's relationship and which Matthew becomes a part of. And we're in on it too, with many shots of all three characters naked, half-dressed, and even in the act of masturbation or sexual intercourse. As I recall, director Bernardo Bertolucci stops short of any erect penises or spread beaver shots... but otherwise it's quite explicit. Not just brief butt shots or glimpses of dicks in passing, but matter-of-fact inclusion of the naughty bits for as long as they're in the frame. The "scenery", whether it's the thin but amply-breasted Eva Green, the handsome well-built Louis Garrel, the deliciously androgynous Michael Pitt, or all three of them, is eye-candy, to be sure.

One of the things that binds the three together is their shared love of cinema, including classics from the early decades of filmmaking. They debate Buster Keaton vs. Charlie Chaplin, in the kind of intellectual discussion that it seems only the young - and enthusiasts - engage in. They re-enact scenes from various films, mostly as part of "name that film" challenges to each other, and some of these scenes are intercut into the scenes we are watching. This is clearly one cinéaste (Bertolucci) catering to the cinéastes in the audience.

In Paris in 1968, participating in the avant garde cinema scene was a revolutionary act, one which led to greater demonstrations and eventually riots in the streets. Going to see The Dreamers in America in 2004 is something of a revolutionary act as well. At the end of a row of screens showing Our Lord and Savior redeeming us on the cross, here's a movie of teenage siblings sharing a bed, and two guys taking baths together. Just buying a ticket for it takes a stand for freedom of expression... even the freedom to think of and talk about incest, homoeroticism, and revolution. (Just don't get too overexcited about the homoeroticism; the movie doesn't shy away from it, but both boys are far more interested in the girl than in each other.)

An interesting comparison of the two films: many Christian congregations have rented Sunday-morning showings of The Passion and held their worship services there, even including older children. Hard to think of many R-rated films they'd do that for. But then, the rating is for extreme and explicit violence; it reportedly has no sexual content to speak of. Meanwhile, The Dreamers has little violence (just a few brief police-vs-protestors scenes, nothing you don't see on the 6:00 news), but is rated NC17 for nudity and sexually explicit scenes. I certainly wouldn't recommend it for children, and I can't imagine any teenager making it through the movie in the company of their parents without dying of embarassment. So the rating is probably appropriate. But the raiting also limits the number of places that will screen it; The Passion is on 20 or so screens in this area, at least one screen at even the smallest beyond-the-suburbs multiplex; The Dreamers is on one, probably for one week only.

Anyway, The Dreamers is worth seeing for more than just "making a statement" or for the prurient thrills of watching this not-quite-ménage-à-trois in action (though it's worthwhile for either of those reasons alone). As I said, it's also worthy as a movie about the movies, and what they can mean to certain people in uncertain times.