Much of the film's success can also be attributed to the casting of the three essentially unknown actors. Michael Pitt ("Hedwig and the Angry Inch") plays the starry-eyed American, smitten with luscious Eva and moody Theo, and their book-filled, twisting, turning, magnificent Paris apartment. Blond, bony, and blue-eyed, Pitt seems a reincarnation of the young Leo DiCaprio who tragically stole Claire Dane's heart in Baz Luhrmann's "Romeo and Juliet."
Louis Garrel has a long French nose and dark-eyed intensity. His fine acting is overshadowed by Bertolucci's discovery of Eva Green, a theater-trained actress in her first feature film. Gorgeous and irrepressible, Isabelle convincingly reveals an insecure self behind a confident façade, the twin who does not know how to separate from her other half. Green has physical allure like no one else on the screen today--she is movie-star thin but also voluptuous, with pale skin, dark intelligent eyes, and long dark hair. She is certainly worth gazing at.
"The Dreamers" has already gained considerable notoriety for its NC-17 rating. There is not a terrific amount of actual sex; instead, the anticipation of sex permeates the closed-off squalor of the labyrinthine apartment. You can count on frequent nudity, the occasional sight of a penis, a long, talky scene in the bath, and Eva Green in various stages of undress.
When done well, stories of personal awakenings are always fascinating, and deserve to be told again and again. As Bertolucci deftly makes us aware, self-discovery is engrossing and all consuming, even when the world outside is literally erupting. Multiply discovery by three, focus the lens on three beautifully earnest protagonists, and the pleasure is that much greater.
