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Bertolucci: 'The Dreamers': Fucking Classic

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Out this Friday in the UK. Can't praise this too highly. Shame all the press will go to 'School of Rock' (I'm psyched about that too) cos this is a real treasure. Sex, left-wing politics, cinephilia -- this film has it all.

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 15:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't trust you about this Bertolucci revival business cause you liked guffy old 'The Sheltering Sky'.

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 15:57 (twenty-two years ago)

My post from the "Venice (the city)thread:

Oh, and I saw Bertolucci's "The Dreamers" while I was there. Granted in Italian. I thought it was a dud, although the girl is incredibly beautiful. The sex hype is a bit...well...hyped. It's got a lot of graphic sex, but in some ways, Bertol. pulls his punches. Ultimately a bit conventional.

HOWEVER, if someone has seen this in a language he/she actually speaks, please let me know if the dialogue is so good that the film is rendered worthwhile. I'm all ears!

-- Skottie (n...), October 17th, 2003.


― Skottie, Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:00 (twenty-two years ago)

When did I rep 'The Sheltering Sky'? I think it's underrated, and the last 20min are exceptional, but it's no 'The Conformist'.

This is much better.

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Upon reflection, I'm not sure if it has all that much graphic sex, it has a lot of unapologetic nudity, which isn't really the same thing. Unless you're american. And I am. Sort of recalls Tuomas's comments on various threads about americans and discomfort with skin, their own and others. Because the two male leads show all their talents to the cameras, this movie is controversial. That's kind of lame. Still sticking to earlier comment that the girl is spectacular, however.

― Skottie, Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:04 (twenty-two years ago)

can't wait to see it! amateurist already has I think.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:08 (twenty-two years ago)

On the Elephant thread, Enrique:

Vraiment, and then he came BACK with this one which roxxor. 'Last Emperor' and 'Sheltering Sky' were good too.

-- Enrique (miltonpinsk...), November 7th, 2003.

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, I'll stick with 'good'.

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:11 (twenty-two years ago)

anna was v keen on it too.

― toby (tsg20), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:12 (twenty-two years ago)

I shdn't have mentioned the sex in my first post, cos that is being dwelt on far too much. It's a funny, light film, which feels more youthful than anything I've seen in a long time (by a director of some four decades' standing).
I've written about Bertolucci and 1968 before, and tried hard to get something down about this (you could call it a situationist film, from a certain angle), but can't really get concise. Because of its references, it's intertexts, I suppose I'm this film's Ideal Viewer, but I think it's one of the best films of recent years.

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 16:18 (twenty-two years ago)

I am very happy to see Michael Pitt rebound from his Dawson's Creek defection.

― Mary (Mary), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 23:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Isn't this based on a Gilbert Adair nov (uh-oh)?

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Tuesday, 3 February 2004 23:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Really cute european boys are naked in it then? I must pencil this in.

― Sean (Sean), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 06:52 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.cinefile.biz/dreamer1.jpg

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 07:09 (twenty-two years ago)

"Henry Parker"

http://ihatethehead.s5.com/castshots/gallery/mp/hank6.jpg

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 07:16 (twenty-two years ago)

yup, you see all the naughty filthy bits, both of the boys and the girl to boot. And blood.

― Skottie, Wednesday, 4 February 2004 07:39 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah it's based on an adair novel, there's an article by him about it being adapted for screen in the current sight & sound.

― toby (tsg20), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Michael Pitt was on Dawson's Creek??? I only know him from Bully and Hedwig! (And liked him very much in both...)

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:11 (twenty-two years ago)

(Also, apparently he's friends with Gus Van Sant, who originally wanted to cast him in Elephant. The fact that the students in Elephant are all nonprofessional actors is partially because Pitt was busy shooting The Dreamers.)

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Jen's younger (freshman) admirer then boyfriend in the third season, whom she met on the football field. Very moody and brooy, hated Wilmington, was above it all, has nothing good to say about DC, views the experiment as an embarassment. Lives in a "gritty" apartment in BK now.

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:16 (twenty-two years ago)

http://ihatethehead.s5.com/castshots/gallery/mp/hank3.jpg

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Now I'm picturing him whining to Gus Van Sant about the Creek.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Jen and Henry:

http://www.dawsonscreekitalia.homestead.com/files/304_jen_henrydcreek.jpg
http://www.dawsonscreekitalia.homestead.com/files/312_jenhenry.jpg
ihttp://www.dawsonscreekitalia.homestead.com/files/312_jenhenry2.jpg

I actually liked him on the show, he was kind of a dweeb but I thought he and Jen had good chemisty. He was a real sweet/innocent boy which was what she needed at that time. After a get-back-together kiss at the end of the season though, he broke up with her by e-mail in the fall. I think they explained his absence away by saying he went to full-time football school or something...

― Mary (Mary), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 08:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, he was good. And in Bully. I keep expecting him to pop up playing Leonardo Di Caprio's younger brother in something.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 09:17 (twenty-two years ago)

this movie was bullocks

― amateur!st (amateurist), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 09:27 (twenty-two years ago)

No, it fucking rocked. So nerr. Better than any Godard film since 1967.

Why an 'uh-oh' for Adair upthread? He's very talented.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 12:59 (twenty-two years ago)

There was a very good profile of Adair by Kevin Jackson in the Independent's 'Talk of the Town' magazine last weekend, which persuaded me to give him another chance. I never really took to him when he was the IoS film critic - he seemed like such a frightfully prissy Europhile, and his 'Mythologies'-style exercise seemed to take all the fun out of Barthes. Plus 'Surfing the Zeitgeist' is the worst title for a book I have ever seen, though I now understand this was intentional. Would anyone recommend any Adair (nb: not 'A Void')? His book 'Flickers' looked intriguing.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 13:06 (twenty-two years ago)

FLIckers is a beautiful coffee table book, but I dunno if there's much copy in it. He wrote something lengthy in the 80s that Jarvis Cocker checked recently, but I can't remember the title.

He *is* a prissy Europhile, but with a pretty wicked sense of humour -- I can't think of any UK critics, generally of the middlebrow-liberal slant, I enjoy more than him.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 13:14 (twenty-two years ago)

''but I think it's one of the best films of recent years''

big thing to say without explaining why. its a bad sign.

(I am anticipating this :))

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 13:16 (twenty-two years ago)

I can't explain in the space of a post why I think that, soz. Manages to graft tired movie/reality confusion tropes on to semi-serious political project. Makes Marx, Freud, and Godard fuck like beasts in the Rue d'Ulm. That sort of stuff.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 13:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Independent's 'Talk of the Town' magazine

I love that magazine and we don't get in Scotland bah.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I haven't bought the Indy in a long long time. What day is 'Talk of the Town'? Isn't 'TotT' a New Yorker section anyway?

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:18 (twenty-two years ago)

It's a (loosely) London focussed supplement with the Independent on Sunday. Presumably not distributed outside the M25.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:26 (twenty-two years ago)

(full of interesting little articles by freelancers on various things, a bit like that newish G2 page. More illustrations than photos, IIRC)

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:27 (twenty-two years ago)

(As the name implies, it is a complete rip-off of the NYer - right down to typography.)

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha -- here is my one and only chance to 'do a suzy' and drop the name of someone I know who works ver high up at the IoS. There we go. Done.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Who doesn't know someone at the IoS?!

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Well indeed, I know three people there, but one of them is very high up indeed. Don't rain on my parade!

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Amateurist, come back and explain yrself!

Meanwhile, Pitt gets the Avedon treatment:

http://www.newyorker.com/images/critics/040209cr_r12923_p198.jpg

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 4 February 2004 14:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I open my mailbox today and the first issue of my recently renewed Time Out is there--with our boy topless on the cover.

With his girlfriend:

http://content.clearchannel.com/Photos/male_celebrities/michael_pitt_girlfriend_Law.jpg

― Mary (Mary), Thursday, 5 February 2004 02:39 (twenty-two years ago)

movie is ostensibly about something, right?

[shades eyes, gives long searching look upthread]

or no?

― rejoinder, Thursday, 5 February 2004 03:56 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.cinefile.biz/dreamer3.jpg

― Mary (Mary), Thursday, 5 February 2004 04:37 (twenty-two years ago)

do you still have this sunday's talk of the town, nipper? any chance of a photocopy of said article? last sunday was the first time i didn't buy the IoS for about six months :-(

― toby (tsg20), Thursday, 5 February 2004 07:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Sorry Toby, it got chucked out - I imagine the PF may still have it though.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Thursday, 5 February 2004 08:34 (twenty-two years ago)

He has the same "face like a slapped arse" look as early Bryan McFadden.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 5 February 2004 09:09 (twenty-two years ago)

i have read the review of this film in uncut. says that it is pretentious pie-in-the-sky rubbish about three bourgeois wasters playing trivial pursuit with film trivia while fucking each other, while outside paris is burning.

so if this is just red adair's biography then i'm not sure i want to waste my time on it. i will wait for the weekend reviews.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 5 February 2004 09:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Toby - check your email (assuming the hotmail one works)

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 5 February 2004 09:33 (twenty-two years ago)

no worry JtN, n.'s sorted me out.

― toby (tsg20), Thursday, 5 February 2004 09:46 (twenty-two years ago)

The uh-oh upthread was because the only novel by Adair that I've read - Love and Death on Long Island - was a total dud, predictable, self-satisfied, Nabakov re-written by a "frightfully prissy europhile". Adair also LOATHES popular music - he once wrote a moronic review of 'Lipstick Traces' where he cldn't understand WHY Marcus might give Johnny Rotten the time of day, let alone treat him sympathetically/critically.

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Thursday, 5 February 2004 10:11 (twenty-two years ago)

On the other hand, he did a fine job of writing a third Alice book, which is my only exposure to him.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 5 February 2004 10:12 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah, i went completely off adair when he regularly used to slag off pop in his observer column back in the early '90s - it makes you doubt his word on everything else that he says. also very disappointed to see david thomson wetting himself about seeing "the dreamers" because it's his old chum adair and my what times we had when we hung out in '68 zzz.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 5 February 2004 10:15 (twenty-two years ago)

film was a mess

what was it about?

much embarrassment

nice credit sequence

― amateur!st (amateurist), Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:29 (twenty-two years ago)

oh dear don't think i'll bother now. i will go and see the new print of murnau's "sunrise" instead.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:30 (twenty-two years ago)

''The uh-oh upthread was because the only novel by Adair that I've read - Love and Death on Long Island - was a total dud, predictable, self-satisfied, Nabakov re-written by a "frightfully prissy europhile".''

wasn't there a movie of the same name?

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, with John Hurt and Jason Priestley.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:32 (twenty-two years ago)

i liked that movie (love and death on long island)

and i sort of like adair as a critic; i haven't read the novel on which this movie is based but i can't imagine it's that good

i honestly feel like this bertolucci thing was so self-evidently a washout that i can't be bothered at this moment to explain why

― amateur!st (amateurist), Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:33 (twenty-two years ago)

oh yes I watched this a couple of years ago on TV. Had some funny moments.

x-post

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 5 February 2004 11:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Marcello -- it is possible to see both 'Sunrise' and this film; I've seen 'Sunrise' twice in the cinema, as indeed, I would imagine, have the characters in 'The Dreamers'. I recall a recent quote from your boss at Uncut about its 'radical' treatment of 'bad boy' directors like, erm, Peckinpah and Coppola (most rockist directors evah?), so forgive me if I wipe my ass on its coverage and its played out rad-chic posturing. Adair maybe a snob, but the vast majority if Uncut writing is rockist.

The people burning Paris were all bourgeois wasters anyhow!

Fair nuff not to like it, of course, but if you like new wave movies, and aren't too purist about it, you'll prolly like this.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 5 February 2004 13:25 (twenty-two years ago)

bonner's not my boss; i once had to punch him in the face to shut him up. that taught him not to try it.

but will self in the standard today has also given it a muted review.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 5 February 2004 13:30 (twenty-two years ago)

bonner's not my boss; i once had to punch him in the face to shut him up.

!!

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:03 (twenty-two years ago)

well he was being arsy.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Look out Barry, there's a new internet hardman in town.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Ha ha

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:16 (twenty-two years ago)

My friend Will Self once worked on film project wiv Bernie Bertolucci. Ouch.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I thought the movie *Love and Death on Long Island* was horrible. And it had such promise. All the critics I've read had thrashed *Dreamers* -- it must be really bad if it is worse than Stealing Beauty and whatever else BB has turned in as of late. It's playing at the Sunshine theatre a few blocks from my house though -- I am tempted.

― Mary (Mary), Thursday, 5 February 2004 22:01 (twenty-two years ago)

It's very difficult to take Henry seriously as an actor in anything else.

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Thursday, 5 February 2004 22:04 (twenty-two years ago)

enrique maybe you could take several posts and explain why you think this film is at all good? i'm interested.

― cozen (Cozen), Thursday, 5 February 2004 22:04 (twenty-two years ago)

i saw michael pitt in the lobby of my office building today. he looked like ASS - jeans with the knees ripped out, too-big plaid shirt, wool hat pulled down over his forehead, and his eyes were scary and bloodshot and red-rimmed.

― lauren (laurenp), Thursday, 5 February 2004 23:54 (twenty-two years ago)

aw, poor Mikey!

― Mary (Mary), Friday, 6 February 2004 00:04 (twenty-two years ago)

mary- 'love and death on long island' liked the bits where the john hurt character was discovering pop culture but it sort of tailed off towards the end. The story has a thing or two in common with thomas mann's 'death in venice' (have not seen the movie but I think you didn't like that at all right?).

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Friday, 6 February 2004 00:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Mrs Nordic won't come and see this with me, so I guess I'm going on my own. Again.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Friday, 6 February 2004 00:45 (twenty-two years ago)

i honestly feel like this bertolucci thing was so self-evidently a washout that i can't be bothered at this moment to explain why

even for those of us who haven't seen it yet?

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Friday, 6 February 2004 07:58 (twenty-two years ago)

michael pitt was bad in this movie

everyone was bad in this movie

this movie is to the french new wave (the romance of which i've never really bought into anyway, none of my favorite films are from that era, chachun a son gout i guess) what forrest gump is to american history

but forrest gump was better

― amateur!st (amateurist), Friday, 6 February 2004 07:58 (twenty-two years ago)

the girl is stacked though if that's your idea of consolation

― amateur!st (amateurist), Friday, 6 February 2004 07:59 (twenty-two years ago)

after i saw the movie i read an interview with bertolucci where he talks about conducting an interview with an italian journalist after his first film (early 60s) and insisting on speaking french because "french is the language of the cinema"

then i made a beeline for the vomitorium

― amateur!st (amateurist), Friday, 6 February 2004 08:00 (twenty-two years ago)

chacun

no "h"

― amateur!st (amateurist), Friday, 6 February 2004 08:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't see the Hoberman line that this is 'Forrest Gump': if it is a traduction of the new wave, then BB at least has a right (ie he was there at the cinematheque, made a new wave movie).

What it's about... if you see '68 as a battle in a kulturkampf rather than as a 'proper' (in the 19th century sense) political uprising, then this film is, I suppose, about that: it's people living out movie phantasy as a political act, a film which takes literally the situationist slogans (eg 'I take dreams for reality because I believe in the reality of my dreams').

Plot-wise, when the cinematheque is closed down by Malraux (De Gaulle's Minister of Culture), so closed down is a way of being that was defining in post-war French culture: the obsessive viewing of Hollywood movies (as well as Rosselini, Bresson, Renoir, &c) at thew cinematheque, an activity always related to the idea of anti-fascism through the figure of cinematheque boss Henri Langlois.

(Simultaneously, or at least from the early-mid sixties, political awareness of the US' imperial role complicated this love, in, for example, Godard's films, like 'Pierrot le Fou' (1965), which attempts to triangulate a love for 'outlaw' movies like 'They Live By Night' and 'You Only Live Once' with hatred for MacNamara-Johnson).

Fundamentally film geekdom is apolitical and dangerous. So the closure releases these fantasists on to the streets of Paris (already a highly mediated, film-set like place, designed like a stage set by Napoleon III). The film fans 'act out'. They do this on the streets; but this film looks instead at three kids acting out indoors. This ties in with then-current ideas, in Wilhem Reich, or whatever, of sexual revolution being equiv to actual revolution.

Anyhoo, to keep it short, they discover that politix is never as simple as a movie. It need not be movies, actually: in the book, the final scene is modelled on Delacroix; in the movie, it's Sam Fuller. But there we are. I tried to make this coherent, but I have work to do.

See it anyway, film critics don't know shit.

― Enrique (Enrique), Friday, 6 February 2004 09:44 (twenty-two years ago)

the film itself though didn't animate these ideas (which are not very interesting ones to begin with, i sort of think marker's 'la fond de l'air est rouge' had t he best stuff to say about the 68 'revolution') in a very intelligent or coherent way

it was more like, a little jean cocteau, a little rock and roll, what can go wrong? nothing really went WRONG, it just wasn't too interesting or compelling

― amateur!st (amateurist), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Well, if the ideas aren't interesting, that's fine (what ideas are interesting, out oif curiousity?), but I think that they are. Marker's film was in an entirely different register: it may have dealt with similar ideas... but it's so different as a film that the comparison breaks down; I mean, neither film is as good on the subject as a well-written book, since film are in general less good at ideas as such than books. Marker's film doesn't have, you know, characters; but anyway that has a late-seventies perspective on '68 that it's impossible to maintain now; this is very much a film of its time.

― Enrique (Enrique), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:17 (twenty-two years ago)

your friend will self was pretty lukewarm about this film in the evening standard yesterday tho

― prima fassy (bob), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:19 (twenty-two years ago)

what about living out a political fact as movie phantasy anyway

― prima fassy (bob), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Right, which is why I said 'ouch'. Much as he's a friend, I think he's a particularly ungenerous reviewer.

All political acts in the post-modern era have in them some sense of their own reception: Bertolucci's best film about '68 is an adaptation of a Borges story ('The Spider's Stratagem') aboiut how history is 'performed'.

― Enrique (Enrique), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:24 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.freewebs.com/sovicious/images/dreamers4.jpg

I liked it a lot.

― Mary (Mary), Saturday, 7 February 2004 06:50 (twenty-two years ago)

The characters in this film were dreadful smartarses and they made me squirm a bit even before they started wanking in front of each other and sticking photos to their bollocks. One of the good things about the film is that Michael Pitt's character appears to be suffering from nappy rash. Another good thing is that it features the mum from 'Fortysomething', one of the more daring examples of Bertolucci's intertextuality. I wouldn't mind seeing it again one day.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Saturday, 7 February 2004 13:32 (twenty-two years ago)

i think i was actually enjoying it modestly until the ending which really seemed to make clear the emptyheadedness of the whole thing

will they join the revolution or won't they? who cares? what does it mean anyway?

i never really understood what was at stake, both in terms of the public events (close down the cinematheque? oh no!) or privately

― amateur!st (amateurist), Saturday, 7 February 2004 23:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I just saw this film. The first hour was very pleasurable: pretty people, pretty clothes, pretty telephones.... and very very pretty clothes. But after that it bored me, and I wished it would end. It's a horrible soundbite but: "'Amelie' for pseuds" sums it up rather too neatly.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:19 (twenty-two years ago)

i think i was actually enjoying it modestly until the ending which really seemed to make clear the emptyheadedness of the whole thing

I thought the reverse - 'ho hum' till the end, which was fantastic.

The girl was not quite as perfectly attractive as the boys.

― Eyeball Kicks (Eyeball Kicks), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:20 (twenty-two years ago)

The girl was tres sportif, I thought... but a weird resemblance to Cat Deeley, facially, was a tremendous distraction.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:22 (twenty-two years ago)

she was cute, but eventually she was simply on screen too much, and nude too often

the red dress she wore on their "date" was naff

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:24 (twenty-two years ago)

also the conversation over the dinner table

how awful was that?

it read like the lines that were there were holding places for some other, better lines that the filmmakers forgot to put in

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Hmmm... none of the actors were good beyond their prettiness, I thought. The bits I enjoyed the most were the plays on old films - that snatch (if you'll pardon the expression) of 'Top Hat'! - the record-breaking run through the museum. There would have been a pretty good short to be made out of this stuff, without the failed pretension of addressing '68'...

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:32 (twenty-two years ago)

making a movie out of allusions to godard movies is like baking a cake made out of mushed up old cookies

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:38 (twenty-two years ago)

I did like the Dad though! And made a mental note to buy a coat just like his!

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:38 (twenty-two years ago)

also why the fuck did they show us the ending of mouchette??????????

i felt more sympathy for the dad than any of the kids

i wanted to go on vacation with him instead of staying in the house

but that scene was still awful

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Jtn, Amelie itself was for pseuds.

http://www.joblo.com/movienews/images3/newsdreamers.jpg

The less clothes the girl wore, the less I liked her.

Tell me about Mouchette.

― Mary (Mary), Sunday, 8 February 2004 01:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Also, could someone post crib notes to all the films referenced in this film? A lot of them I recognized, but a lot of them I did not.

― Mary (Mary), Sunday, 8 February 2004 01:52 (twenty-two years ago)

mouchette is a bresson film from the late 60s

the one in which


HUGE SPOILER

the girl tries several times to commit suicide by rolling down the bank into a river, and finally succeeds

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 02:16 (twenty-two years ago)

It looked great from the clip. I think I will rent it.

― Mary (Mary), Sunday, 8 February 2004 02:18 (twenty-two years ago)

it's liable to send you into a long funk

but it is beautiful

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 02:20 (twenty-two years ago)

i think kim's has it

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 02:21 (twenty-two years ago)

I have to wait until next week, people. But I will see this.

― jaymc (jaymc), Sunday, 8 February 2004 08:14 (twenty-two years ago)

the polaroid stuck to the bollocks = k-classic.

― toby (tsg20), Sunday, 8 February 2004 08:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't think that revealing a Bresson film ends w/ a suicide is SUCH a huge spoiler, Am!

If more ppl like Mary rent Mouchette as a result of 'The Dreamers' then some gd has come out of this mess.

― Andrew L (Andrew L), Sunday, 8 February 2004 08:46 (twenty-two years ago)

but you went and spoiled it anyway!!! at least amateurist warned us

― s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 8 February 2004 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

incidentally, I'm going to have to see this movie, even if it doesn't look very good

(but who knows, I liked "stealing beauty"...)

― s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 8 February 2004 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

just read hoberman's review and he makes some of the same points--except i found the keaton/chaplin thing embarrassing too

key line: "The Dreamers is bad"

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 19:50 (twenty-two years ago)

hoberman can be really funny

mary i'm reading *your* article now

― amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 19:51 (twenty-two years ago)

btw hi amateurist

― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:45 (twenty-two years ago)

The ad for this in the paper has three identical little models laying about like they're on horse tranquilizers.

― Dan I., Monday, 9 February 2004 01:19 (twenty-two years ago)

the french poster is really aggressive t&a, i felt sort of dirty going to see this

― amateur!st (amateurist), Monday, 9 February 2004 08:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw this yesterday, have to agree with Amateurist I'm afraid. I thought it was awful - nicely filmed and all that but the politics and philosophy were trite and simplistic, the DO YOU SEE??? exerpts from other films were naff, the main characters were unbelievable and the ending was just plain rub.

It felt like the cinematic equivalent of being talked down to, very slowly and condescendingly, by someone who is not anywhere as clever as they think they are.

The polaroid on the bollocks scene did make me laugh though.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 14:50 (twenty-two years ago)

I dunno what was 'do you see?' about the excerpts at all... the politics and philosophy were indeed trite, but then the politics and philosophy of gauche youths usually are. I didn't feel talked down to, but if you did fair enough. But what dyou mean by the 'do you see'-ness?

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 14:56 (twenty-two years ago)

You didn't think that bit near the beginning, when the girl was self-consciously moving round the bedroom, pulling off all the (I think) Garbot gestures, interspersed with bits from the original film, was a bit much? I mean, the girl explained it herself, I don't particularly want my hand held through all the parallels.

The characters were all particularly annoying even before they starting fucking and wanking. I really wanted twin brother to actually explode with jealous rage and he never actually did.

One minute the girl is trying to kill all three of them, the next she is out on the street joining the riot? Why? What was the point? What was motivating any of the characters?

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 15:10 (twenty-two years ago)

I didn't think the refs, like the Garbo one, were meant as refs in the 'Reservoir Dogs' fashion: I think the idea was to communicate how much this bunch lived through movies, how their sense of reality/sexuality/politics was structured by film. It might have been overdone, but I thought it was quite fresh. Prolly someone could bring in some Lacanian shit about them learning their place in the world via movies-as-mirror stage.

This was what stands in for psychological motivation. The end of the film, the riot, echoes an earlier scene in the cinema when they're watching 'Shock Corridor' -- they still can't comprehend the politics of the real except through the movie gauze. Again, it's over-ripe, and inadequate as an 'explanation' of 1968, but I think poetically it's sorta valid.

― Enrique (Enrique), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah but it was telegraphs like a fucking dick and jane picture book

One minute the girl is trying to kill all three of them, the next she is out on the street joining the riot? Why? What was the point? What was motivating any of the characters?

is otm

― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 19:30 (twenty-two years ago)

sorry that post was contradictory and had a misspelling to boot but i'm totally out of sorts today so please excuse me if i wait until later to elaborate...

― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 19:43 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah i wish the theo character would literally have exploded leaving the apartment an even further mess

any sort of paranormal phenomena would have improved the film

― amateur!st (amateurist), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 19:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Problem is the Dreamers is set in Paris '69.

Baran at Do You See?

Problem is it's '68 -- but anyway, I think the film's ting -- which may or may not be trite -- is that what's going on inside the flat = shat's going on outside, ie a living out of movie-ish fantasies. Problem is, unless you're into reading about '1968' or have some prior interest in it (same goes for the cinephile stuff -- most people aren't fussed about William Wellman, or whoever) you won't see what Bertolucci is trying to do. He doesn't go far enough in explaining 'les evenements' but basically I think the idea is: this was no 'revolution' in the classic sense, but a demonstration, or film, a play on the streets designed to enlighten people, wake them up, using the media to reveal the hidden 'violence inherent in the system'.

― NRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:09 (twenty-two years ago)

shat = unfortuneate mis-spelling of 'what'.

― NRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:12 (twenty-two years ago)

See we all do typos. (Ahem).

What film are they 'doing' at the end btw when they throw the Molotov cocktail.

― Pete (Pete), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Fuller's 'Shock Corridor,' apparently -- though when I saw it I didn't get the ref. It's quite staged, but... well, in Bert's 'The Spider's Stratagem' he and DP Vittoria Storaro (later did 'Apocalypse Now') make this whole Italian town look like a stage set (which is part of the idea of that film) -- it was v impressive. Didn't come off quite so well here. In the book the American d00d makes like the lassie in the Delacroix painting on their wall, which makes a lot more sense.

― NRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Naturally I have not seen the picture.

I like Miller's review. In a way it anticipates JtN's.

NRQ never did name his IoS contact/s - did he?

Contra JtN, I know no-one at the IoS, or indeed any other newspaper.

But come to think of it, I did meet Steve Tongue 14 years ago.

― the bellefox, Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Who's Miller and where's his review? My contact is, oh God, way up, man.

― NRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:30 (twenty-two years ago)

'MIller's review':

The characters in this film were dreadful smartarses and they made me squirm a bit even before they started wanking in front of each other and sticking photos to their bollocks. One of the good things about the film is that Michael Pitt's character appears to be suffering from nappy rash. Another good thing is that it features the mum from 'Fortysomething', one of the more daring examples of Bertolucci's intertextuality. I wouldn't mind seeing it again one day.

-- PJ Miller (pjmiller6...), February 7th, 2004 1:32 PM.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Hats off! 'Duckface' too.

― NRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 12 February 2004 13:44 (twenty-two years ago)

i'll have what enrique's having

― cozen (Cozen), Thursday, 12 February 2004 19:40 (twenty-two years ago)

i've already had what amateurist is having

and steered clear of pj miller's lot

― cozen (Cozen), Thursday, 12 February 2004 19:46 (twenty-two years ago)

???

― amateur!st (amateurist), Thursday, 12 February 2004 21:31 (twenty-two years ago)

I want to know who you guys saw this with. Were you alone? With a friend? Same sex / opposite sex? Just curious ...

― dean! (deangulberry), Thursday, 12 February 2004 21:34 (twenty-two years ago)

hah sorry amateurist. i just meant i don't understand why enrique's so enthusiastic and kinda agreed w. you on a lot of points and didn't want to agree w. pj miller.

― cozen (Cozen), Thursday, 12 February 2004 22:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw it with my lay-deh, dean.

― NRQ (Enrique), Friday, 13 February 2004 09:27 (twenty-two years ago)

I watched it with my parents.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Friday, 13 February 2004 09:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Okay, not really.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Friday, 13 February 2004 09:30 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw it on my tod.

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 13 February 2004 10:31 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw it with my pal Djuna - who hated it more than I did.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Friday, 13 February 2004 10:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Amateurist is right about the credit sequence though. If only the rest of the film had been that much fun.

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 13 February 2004 11:00 (twenty-two years ago)

A good year for credit sequences preferred to 60s films: that one film with Leo, 'Down with Love,' er, some other films...

― NRQ (Enrique), Friday, 13 February 2004 11:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, the credits were great - I was raving about them to the PF the other night. Reminded me of the Saul Bass credits to 'North by North-West'.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Friday, 13 February 2004 11:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw it on my own. So did the other three or four people in the cinema. I tried to see it in the presence of Bertolucci at the San Sebastian film festival but it was sold out. I'm sure I would have liked it more if I'd got in. I also saw it dubbed into Spanish, which didn't help.

Very good bit of film: the gas pipe scene.

I can't remember the credits.

I don't know what Duckface means.

I can't remember the dad's coat, but I liked him.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Friday, 13 February 2004 21:21 (twenty-two years ago)

two weeks pass...
I liked it very much, but I hope I see a better film this year.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Tuesday, 2 March 2004 12:10 (twenty-one years ago)

I thought for a film so steeped in film history one of its biggest problems was that the only memorable shots were those taken from other films. If the characters are going to be as one-dimensional as Bertolucci's made them the film has to look amazing. I found each clip from a new wave film only underlined the paucity of dull images in the one I was watching.
Where was the shot of the guy dying outstreched in a cross of light from?..beautiful.

― winterland, Tuesday, 2 March 2004 12:24 (twenty-one years ago)

who saw the documentary on it last night? enrq?

― cozen (Cozen), Tuesday, 2 March 2004 12:53 (twenty-one years ago)

I saw it. Immensely interesting, albeit brazen advertising, and I shall definitely go and see it at the weekend.

― Japanese Giraffe (Japanese Giraffe), Tuesday, 2 March 2004 13:24 (twenty-one years ago)

four months pass...
This was so, so bad in almost every conceivable way. Bad enough to be compelling, because I wanted to see how much worse it could get. Bertolucci should have stopped with the parents coming in to see their kids nekkid in a compromising position and scurrying out. That just sent the "what the hell" meter off the charts.

It feels weird saying this, but amateurist is right about the French girl being naked too much.

(check out the DVD for the video of Michael Pitt performing "Hey Joe" - it's even funnier than the movie. Kurt Cobain called, Michael, he wants his fashion sense back.)

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Sunday, 1 August 2004 19:09 (twenty-one years ago)

I feel that this film is maturing like fine wine.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Monday, 2 August 2004 09:18 (twenty-one years ago)

(check out the DVD for the video of Michael Pitt performing "Hey Joe" - it's even funnier than the movie. Kurt Cobain called, Michael, he wants his fashion sense back.)

whaaa?

― amateur!st (amateurist), Monday, 2 August 2004 13:03 (twenty-one years ago)

i saw bertolucci being interviewed last week, he has bad hair.

― amateur!st (amateurist), Monday, 2 August 2004 13:07 (twenty-one years ago)

The "Hey Joe" performance in the movie is Michael Pitt and some band I've never heard of. Bertolucci did a music video of it - mostly Pitt walking around in ripped jeans and flannel/sweatshirts or performing in the studio (also in ripped jeans and...)

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Monday, 2 August 2004 15:08 (twenty-one years ago)

One of the greater unintentional comedies of the last several years.

― Softly Weeping at the Oki Dog (Ben Boyer), Monday, 2 August 2004 15:38 (twenty-one years ago)

Now if the other two kids had been Noel and Mitch...

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Tuesday, 3 August 2004 09:59 (twenty-one years ago)

i cant believe that i didnt mention how much i hated this movie.

i agree with amateurist on the most part.

there was no point, lots of nudity, and a couple of really nasty scenes.

my least favorite movie of the year... and i have seen "win a date with tad hamilton"

― todd swiss (eliti), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 05:43 (twenty-one years ago)

I saw it last night. It was okay, it was good. Actually it was really good considering the alternatives, since my wife picked it out and her criterion for movie selection is, no exaggeration, to pick movies the boxes of which have actors wearing as little clothing as possible (eg: Night Encounter 4 or Silk Stalkings 17, etc).

― Dan I. (Dan I.), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 08:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Saw this months ago. Really loved it though I usually hate Bertolucci. I'm a bit surprised by the negative reactions to the dreamers I've seen on this thread..

Obstensibly it's an interesting indictment of the cinephile generation but it speaks to universalities beyond the subject and historical context. The protagonist is initially intrigued by the exotic, sexy brother and sister duo until he becomes gradually aware that his friends have a destructive dependency on each other.

The narrative progress of the main character's gradual disillusionment and the increasingly fragile mental state of the brother/sister was very compelling; eventual tragedy casts a growing shadow over everything.

The end was interesting because it suggests that political activism replaces cinephilia as a means of avoiding real life for the siblings. In this way, the end reminded me of something once said by Boyd Rice about how "politics is for people who can't run their own lives." The film implies that cinema and politics could be interchangable in that last sentence.

― herbert hebert (herbert hebert), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 08:07 (twenty-one years ago)

The Michael Pitt video performance of "Hey Joe" mentioned up thread sounds very interesting considering that he's apparently set to play Kurt Cobain in the new Gus Van Sant film.

― herbert hebert (herbert hebert), Wednesday, 4 August 2004 08:10 (twenty-one years ago)

two months pass...
This is out on DVD now. It 'contains strong sex'. It also contains some extras, like commentary from Bertolucci and Adair and someone else, and a 'featurette' about the events of May 1968. I am wondering if anyone knows if it's any good, the featurette. It also contains a video of Michael Pitt and his Rock Buddies in action. (I see that this has already been biggied up above.)

For the time being, I shall put it on my 'four for twenty pounds' list.

I like this film a lot better as time goes on.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Monday, 18 October 2004 14:49 (twenty-one years ago)

two months pass...
Wasn't this rated NC-17 for the intensity of the Chaplin-Keaton argument?

Nuts to Bertolucci for scotching the boy-boy sex (in the novel apparently). Pitt was stiff (heh) throughout, but at least he looked good with menstrual blood on his lips.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 14:46 (twenty-one years ago)

ten months pass...
Naked boys on the screen = nervous clothed boys in the audience

the dreamers


Imagine, "rampant faggotry" with no m2m sex even.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 6 December 2005 16:28 (twenty years ago)

*sigh*

― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 6 December 2005 16:30 (twenty years ago)

yeah they cut out the gay scenes which were in the novel.

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 6 December 2005 16:30 (twenty years ago)

two months pass...
Phwooar! Bertolucci Bird Goes Bond!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4722848.stm

(The Dreamers is now available for £5 from Fopp. I see upthread that this is something I have been waiting for.)

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Friday, 17 February 2006 11:57 (twenty years ago)

B-b-but teh film is DUD. £5 is too much for this. I'd pay £2 for the credit sequence maybe.

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 17 February 2006 12:37 (twenty years ago)

It's a classic of fucking, but as a film it's a dud.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Friday, 17 February 2006 14:24 (twenty years ago)

She is the new Bond girl.

I think she is a bit too blotchy.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Friday, 17 February 2006 14:49 (twenty years ago)

Gawd, she's beautiful. Based on the cast choices so far I think this new Bond film may, surprisingly, be good. And classy.

― Jay Vee (Manon_70), Friday, 17 February 2006 15:15 (twenty years ago)

this page is certainly worth looking at

― kyle (akmonday), Friday, 17 February 2006 15:25 (twenty years ago)

The Dreamers is neither classic nor dud (tho some of the criticisms that the '68 riots are peripheral to the young characters strike me as stupid -- duh, they're too horny and film-obsessed to care til they can't ignore em), but the Garrel boy is hotter in Ma Mere, a much worse film. And fuck any more fucking Bond films, you lonely masturbators.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Friday, 17 February 2006 15:39 (twenty years ago)

Hey, I always have company when I masturbate!

― July Jones, Friday, 17 February 2006 16:24 (twenty years ago)

this was prob the most disappointing film i've seen in the last couple years. all the 'film geek' talk - chaplin vs keaton etc - was hopelessly contrived and lame. amateurist is right. forrest gump was better.

best bits: seeing the clips of "bout de souffle," "mouchette" et al and thinking "god i wish i were watching that instead."

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Friday, 17 February 2006 20:40 (twenty years ago)

J.D. otm. The sex is also stupendously unerotic. Watching the film was like submitting to the gnarled clutches of a dirty old man who insisted on beating me off himself.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Friday, 17 February 2006 20:45 (twenty years ago)

Ma Mere is way hotter than The Dreamers, on the whole.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Friday, 17 February 2006 21:51 (twenty years ago)

You mean hymen-blood fingerpainting isn't a deep and meaningful symbol of the bourgeois blah blah blah blah

― Erick Dampier is better than Shaq (miloaukerman), Saturday, 18 February 2006 01:11 (twenty years ago)

Enrique is OTM in this thread. This is a very good film, and I thought it was smarter and less patronising than everyone else seems to think.

I think it's mistaken to try to attribute some clear motivation to e.g. the sister's actions, unless the motivation is (as Enrique sez above) simply the living of life as a cinematic fantasy - sex, suicide and sedition are all of a type therefore.

I had a further theory on this film which I expounded quite enthusiastically in the months after seeing it, but i'd have to watch it again to remember what it was.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Saturday, 18 February 2006 14:51 (twenty years ago)

Oh come on, Morbius. Bond should never END!

― Under the paving stones, Paul Scholes (nordicskilla), Saturday, 18 February 2006 17:28 (twenty years ago)

FINNEY-MILLER ACCORD 2006

― The Man Without Shadow (Enrique), Monday, 20 February 2006 09:48 (twenty years ago)

one year passes...

Hmmm, this is on IFC tonight.

― Rock Hardy, Thursday, 31 January 2008 00:21 (eighteen years ago)

DON'T DO IT YOU WILL REGRET IT

― milo z, Thursday, 31 January 2008 00:49 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, but EVA GREEN'S SQUEAKY BITS.

― Rock Hardy, Thursday, 31 January 2008 01:30 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.robbscelebs.co.uk/noops540_18/noops_dreamers_eva_green_hdtv.html

there, now go write a letter to your dear mum.

― wanko ergo sum, Thursday, 31 January 2008 01:35 (eighteen years ago)

too much fucking sex in this movie. it's like watching a frustrated junior high student's fantasy about what life is supposed to be like

STUPID

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:22 (eighteen years ago)

the Italian boy's cute!

too much cooter and period blood though.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:24 (eighteen years ago)

i didn't say he wasn't cute. i'd rather just watching him in a fucking porn tho.

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:24 (eighteen years ago)

yea grammar is good.

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:25 (eighteen years ago)

you'd think he and Michael Pitt would fuck already; all we get is some brief (but hot) barefoot footsie in the last third.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:33 (eighteen years ago)

Ah this movie. The lovers. The dreamers. And me.

― Eric H., Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:34 (eighteen years ago)

Oh wait, I was thinking of a different movie.

― Eric H., Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:34 (eighteen years ago)

lol this movie is the worst - not even hot chix can save it

― jhøshea, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:37 (eighteen years ago)

I saw this when I was in my absurdly stupid & naive "omg May 68 is the greatest & most important thing etc" phase, and I loved it.

Should see it again to see if I still dig it.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:44 (eighteen years ago)

it is dreadful

― wanko ergo sum, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:48 (eighteen years ago)

except for parts

― wanko ergo sum, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:48 (eighteen years ago)

lol i didn't even know that was a pitt!!

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 03:54 (eighteen years ago)

lol I was playing poker and forgot to turn it on

― Rock Hardy, Thursday, 31 January 2008 05:22 (eighteen years ago)

Bertolucci was making trash for the last 15 years or so imo.
this one is no exception
a flattering and fake "art" movies.

― Zeno, Thursday, 31 January 2008 05:48 (eighteen years ago)

making a movie out of allusions to godard movies is like baking a cake made out of mushed up old cookies
-- amateur!st (amateurist), Sunday, 8 February 2004 00:38 (3 years ago

this is my favorite thing ever said on a film thread

― J.D., Thursday, 31 January 2008 07:48 (eighteen years ago)

the most embarrassing thing about this movie was how it came from someone you knew to be once adept in conveying conveying cinematic eroticism, "artfully" but not glibly. this was like watching an old man jack off to old notions of cinematic power - and their adolescent presentation, amongst these adolescents, makes *the ideas* seem adolescent.

which is a shame and not true at all, for cinema really can inspire social change, reflect political unrest, what-have-you. but here it all becomes narratively obtuse, and masturbatory in every sense

and like my fellow f4gs have said, anyone watching this for m2m akshun will just wind up with blueballs. better to just google images of the actors you find attractive, and rewatch "The Conformist" again

― Vichitravirya_XI, Thursday, 31 January 2008 12:17 (eighteen years ago)

yea this movie was terrible

― Mark Clemente, Thursday, 31 January 2008 13:11 (eighteen years ago)

vichi otm

mark otm

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 13:23 (eighteen years ago)

Not terrible, but not very good either... it had a couple of things going for it... eh? eh?... knowhorrimean, missus... phwoar... eh?

― Tom D., Thursday, 31 January 2008 13:26 (eighteen years ago)

it was pretentious and unintelligent, and the only thing it had going for it was flesh, which i can find more of

somewhere else.

― Surmounter, Thursday, 31 January 2008 13:59 (eighteen years ago)

^^yes.

― Mark Clemente, Thursday, 31 January 2008 16:04 (eighteen years ago)

I think it is good.

I think I thought it was bad upthread.

We have the DVD.

I think it is pretty good, you know.

― PJ Miller, Thursday, 31 January 2008 18:52 (eighteen years ago)


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