In Richard Ivan Jobs’ article youth movements: travel, protest and Europe in 1968 he make interesting arguments regarding how travel amongst young Europeans instigated a sort of “transnational social group” at the time surrounding 1968. This travel created awareness of all Europeans and many young Europeans were becoming involved in the politics and revolutions in countries that were not their own, and this was also seen at an international level. Jobs states, “These communities of young travelers contributed to the ethos of integration through their familiarity with one another and their experiences with foreign places, peoples and cultures” (378). In the film Dreamers, we are introduced to an American traveling to Europe during this time of revolution, Matthew, who meets French twins Isabelle and Theo, children of a famous poet. While the theme of unity and oneness is seen in the relationship between Theo, Isabelle, and Matthew the theme of politics is addressed a bit differently. Now I don’t really feel that Isabelle and Theo were as interested in becoming a part of the transnational politics that were taking place as much as Matthew might have been, and to this point there is an interesting statement made at dinner when Theo’s father is speaking to him and says, “Listen to me, Theo. Before you can change the world you must realize that you, yourself, are part of it. You can't stand outside looking in.” There is something to be said for how comfortable Isabelle and Theo are in their own relationship and the kind of turned eye that they have of the politics and realities of the world at the time. For example, there are a few scenes where they are either cooking or indulging in one another while tear gas is dispersing riots on the streets.They do join these riots to an extent but aren't actively involved in the politics. I felt that it was interesting that the father was communicating this idea of international involvement when Jobs, was speaking of the generation that would be the age of Theo and Isabelle in his article.
Yes, and with the opening credits sequence, starting the film with the Eiffel Tower is appropriate given it is undoubtedly the #1 tourist attraction in Paris. The irony is that most of the film is spent in the housing complex than touring the city despite the fact that in the late 1950s/early1960s many European countries undergo an economic boom through an increase in urbanization, thereby more people are receiving disposable income and are purchasing cars, television sets, and home appliances. With Jobs’ article stating that “young people were increasingly viewing the world in international terms,” this notion of the economic boom and tourism help explain how “news travels fast” globally and how younger people would become more aware of unfamiliar countries and culture. It’s also interesting to note that Michael arrives in Paris in the spring of 1968 when the article states that “ordinary tourists” stayed away from the city due to the recent protests. Michael, as he admits though at the beginning of the film, is no ordinary tourist as he is privileged to be among a small “cult” of film enthusiasts. The scene where Theo and Isabelle’s parents discover the three sleeping together, to me, that seems the film attempts to take a “moral” position on the character’s actions for throughout the film acts in a very playful manner with the group whether it involves intercutting black–and–white film footage within a scene or using specific staging and lighting to make Isabelle appear like a Greek sculpture. As all the characters are ascribing to Timothy Leary’s theory of “turn on, tune in, and drop out,” it is the youth revolution that “saves them.” I have not seen many of Bertolucci’s films, but from films like The Spider’s Stratagem and The Conformist, he definitely holds strong political beliefs, but I feel in this film, it is not clear if he is embracing the characters’ self–absorbed lifestyles or condemning them.
It seems odd to watch a film by an Italian director, about a Californian boy and two French siblings in Paris. Unlike "Something In The Air," "The Dreamers," does not appear to be inspired by actual events in the directors life. In fact, the film is based on the book "The Holy Innocents" by Gilbert Adair. So, this story isn't autobiographical, and is being told from the outside, looking in, instead of an insider perspective as in "Something in The Air." And this is not the only difference between these two films."Something in the Air," because of it's auto-biographical nature, contains the sense of realism, of trying to portray the world and the time exactly as it was before. In "The Dreamers," the characters and the setting and the plot appear to be symbolic in nature. Matthew is from California, which is important, because that is where the height of 68 fervor is happening in America. He comes to Paris and meets Theo and Isabelle, who appear to be archetypes of the French youth of the time. A description of this archetype can be found in the essay May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics, where it states "This was a generation, once again, perhaps the first in history, for which the imperatives of material necessity ceased to dominate the every day life. Thus, unlike previous generations, postwar youth was increasingly able to turn its attention toward qualitative and spiritual pursuits." Theo and Isabelle are very well off, the children of an intellectual, who disregard the idea of getting a job. Their entire life appears to be leisure time. And with all that freedom, they started wanting more freedom. Not just from a job or from capitalism, but freedom from cultural norms as well. Once again, from the May 1968 essay, "In the post-May period, the Situationist focus on everyday life fused with the Maoist notion of cultural revolution. In this way, the project of a revolution of everyday life was born. "Revolution" no longer meant seizing power or socializing the means of production. It connoted instead a grassroots transformation of interpersonal relations and living conditions." I'm fairly certain, that in every seen of incest in the film, Mao is somewhere in the room. But even if that isn't right, Mao is still in a surprising amount of shots. And this returns to my previous point. This incest is symbolic. It is an extreme outcome of extreme freedom. It is radical cultural revolution.
I feel as though Bertolucci’s The Dreamers does an effective job of navigating the murky waters of representing the student protestors during the events of May ’68, reflecting on both their criticism and their apparent strengths. For example, the film expends quite a bit of energy exploring the issue of privileged bourgeois students engaging in Marxist/Maoist/Communist discourse through the character Théo, who, although interested in shaking things up, is shown at first to be somewhat passive and ineffective in his political theorizing. Throughout his bedroom are tokens emblematic of Théo’s political leanings, a light up Mao lamp and a gigantic poster for Godard’s La Chinoise to name a few examples, yet the fact that we know how he lays around his apartment all day and relies on his father to provide disposable income by leaving checks on the mantle somewhat damages his credibility. This idea is represents the views of criticisms of the student movement at the time in which, as Peter Wollen describes, “the Communists had belittled the student insurrection as a revolt led by spoiled “daddy’s boys”—hence, from a working-class standpoint, irrelevant” (91). This criticism is mirrored somewhat by Matthew when the two are arguing politics, pointing out the window and claiming that Théo should be out on the streets demonstrating instead of talking film and politics in isolation with him and his sister in their father’s apartment.
Despite his failings, however, Théo does, in the end, channel his political zeal into direct action and ends up on the front lines of the student standoff with the police. Once on the street, his immediate decision to head to the front and pick up a Molotov cocktail displays the idealistic commitment that the students showed in their spontaneous protests and demonstrations. Political posters and graffiti that cover the outer walls of buildings and constantly droning police sirens in the distance are spread throughout the film to further evidence the ongoing struggle of the students, demonstrating that, even though Théo might not yet have joined the fray, there were others like him in the streets spreading a message. Despite the criticisms of the established Communist and Maoist groups who dismissed their efforts as, in Wollen’s words, “lacking the requisite proletarian content,” the students still managed to organize “the largest demonstration Paris had seen since the Popular Front era” (92). The students were putting feet on the ground and making an effort to shake things up leaving “the Communists and their allies, the CGT, trailing contritely behind” (92).
Bertolucci’s “The Dreamers” seems to be inspired from an outsider perspective. Mathew being from California, where the largest film industry in the U.S is located gets overlooked as a vital character to establishing Isabelle as a Marxist, as well as Mathew’s attempts to sway the Théo towards a non-violent activist approach. Mathew in my opinion makes the biggest impact on the film. Its through his eyes that we get to know the true characters of Théo and Isabelle. I find it intriguing that instead of waking up the three sleeping in a makeshift fort that typically kids would build, the parents instead leave another check for them to cash and leave, never to be seen in the film again. I feel that the point of this scene is to establish inconsistencies with Théo and Isabelle’s association with the student movement. The parents are giving them money and funding their alcohol fueled social escapades and not holding them accountable. Théo was viewed as the dominate one of the relationship between the three of them and The end scene of the three of them joining people gathered in the street for a demonstration came as a surprise. It gave me the impression that Théo was easily influenced and mislead by his attachment to Isabelle. Mathew joining Théo and his sister’s complex relationship is instrumental in understanding how the director displays the evolution of student relationships during the student movement. Breaking traditional norms was a consistent theme in “The Dreamers”. There were clearly multiple scenes in the film that were designated to the taboo of incest. These scenes are clearly hard to elaborate and make sense of. From my understanding though, these controversial scenes represent a raw sense of individualism and liberation.
Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers deals with the youth revolutions in Paris, through the minds of the youth themselves. Although through the majority of the film, we do not see the revolts as they happen, we do get a sense of what is going on. The first time Matthew meets Theo and Isabelle, they are at a protest. You can already see the contrast between the characters. Matthew, introverted and observational, Isabelle, sultry and mysterious, and Theo, distant and confident, yet all have strong beliefs and a love for the cinema. In Richard Wolin’s “May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics” he talks how the “middle-class youth had at its disposal the leisure time necessary for self-reflection and self-cultivation” (72). This was the perfect time for teenagers and young adults to reflect and try to understand what was going on in the world. But with this time to surround them with the real issues that were happening in the world, they needed a way to make sense and to make a difference. But in others, they got wrapped up in their own worlds, as does Isabelle and Theo and then more-so Matthew. Throughout the movie, we see the effects of that in the movie. Isabella and Theo are so submerged in the relationship that they share that when they befriend Matthew there façade of a world starts to crack, just as their own innocence. The interworking of the three-way relationship and the dynamics are seen in the real world. How the teenagers and young adults in different parts of the world are so submerged in the ideas that they conceived about how the war and the rest of the world should be dealt with.
The Dreamers (2003) was the most sexually open and progressive in the sense that it displayed a type of sexuality that would be considered obscene by traditional western standards. This sexuality was interesting because of the forefront roll that it took in the film. There was incestuous and homosexual tension that was expressed throughout the film, both of which were never shown. Both of these sexual acts would have been considered very taboo in the sixties.
What I find more interesting, however, is after reading Richard Ivan Jobs’ article Youth Movements: Travel, Protest, and Europe in 1968, I could not help but to see the relationship between the three characters as being a metaphor for the cultural integration that was occurring across the globe. The American, Matthew, was not embraced by just the French culture but French people as well. While the character of Matthew disagreed with Theo and Isabella, most notably about the soldiers in the Vietnam War and the use of violence as a means to an end, all three of them had a similar cultural experience through the movies that they had watched in love.
They defined themselves almost literally in the film by the films that they had watched. They acted out scenes and lived their lives like those of the characters in film. Their lives began to imitate art. They also used the knowledge of film to encourage each other to do things that they may not have been comfortable with. This is an instance of the characters using a shared experience to connect with one another. Shared experiences, in this case, led to a connectedness that would not have existed otherwise.
As Daniel has already pointed out, The Dreamers (2004) focuses mostly on the internal life of the students through their bourgeois status, their economic class, their privileged education, and their purely ideological practice. While the film experiences limitations from being an adaptation of the book The Holy Innocents by Gilbert Adair, the film further experiences limitations through the spatial restrictions. This focusing of limitation forces the audience to take a close-up look at the “revolutionaries,” not as trouble-maker, but as people within the context of their lived experiences and private spaces. When depicted in the streets, throwing rocks, kicking, screaming, and revolting, it is simple to washout individualism and generalize the student movement of the late 1960s as a mindless,violent mob. What Bernardo Betolucci accomplished is to view his characters through “their unself-conscious intensity, grazing affectionately at these children who speak solemnly of ‘cinema’...and for whom the movies, far from being an escape from the world, are a means of entry into it” (Scott). Neither accidental, or unsupported, the specific usage of the word “children” to depict the characters is well mirrored throughout the film. From the Victorian feel of Isabelle’s bedroom, which holds a pristine disassociation from the rest of the trashed house, to her teddy bears, to the childish games, to the “clean” incestuous relationship, to the economic dependence, etc., the characters get caught in the safety of the interior and the denial of the exterior. This metaphor for the fine light between childhood and adulthood is most poignantly depicted when their abandonment of the interior is protected by their attempts to bring the childish safety to the exterior, as when they play games at the Louvre, run carelessly through the rain, or go on an innocent date. Matthew’s character, which as the film progresses becomes aware of it, questions the attitudes and behaviors of his friends. Throughout, they are confronted by the realities of life, they’re refusal to accept and to grow concludes through the literal infiltration of the outside to the inside. With the interior contaminated by the outside, they can’t deny their evolution from children into adults. Theo’s action to throw the bottle is as significant as Matthew’s decision to abandon the resistance. It is no longer a game. It is real life, and it comes with real consequences. Furthermore, the disassociation of the characters to the burning world outside, to the “revolution,” to the counterculture, infiltrates through their fixation and idealization of the movies, of the ideas, of the possibilities--showing that even the most guarded,oblivious youth was affected by the environment. This overarching influence of the world into all places serves The Dreamers well. As the audience, we can observe their private lives, the behind closed doors intimacies, but we can also feel the inescapable sense of the times, the homogeneous idealism and believes. The film has the Hollywood spectacle, but it also has the influences of a well-experienced, knowledgeable filmmaker who contemplates the past in a wickedly romantic, and uncensored crude manner. Again to quote Scott’s review, “movie love is not only the subject of ''The Dreamers,'' but also its method,” (Scott).
Scott, A. O. “The Dreamers (2003): FILM REVIEW; When to Be Young Was Very Sexy,” The New York Times. Feb. 6, 2014. Web. Oct.7, 2014.
The most important thing to keep in mind while watching The Dreamers (Bernardo Bertolucci, 2003) is that it is a fairly un-self-aware depiction of the revolution through the lens of bourgeoisie youth. Even more important than the cultural differences between the American Matthew and the French twins Isabelle and Theo is the contrast of these young adults who can afford (literally) to lounge about in a cushy penthouse while revolution rages on the street outside (literally). The fact that this is all literally shown, on screen, might make it seem that perhaps the movie is a little more aware of its privileged point of view, but tonally and narratively, it is not. For example, a rock has be thrown through the window to (again, literally) wake up the trio of lovers to the facts of the revolution.
And the revolution is not even the focus of The Dreamers. Although it opens with the closing of the cinema – which at first seems like it could be a jumping-on point for activism – the national turmoil is utterly sidelined to instead focus on the youths hanging out while the parents are away; without the older generation who remembers what revolution used to/can/should be like and who will challenge the younger generation to get off their tuckuses and DO SOMETHING CONSTRUCTIVE, the indolent children act as they please, which is to say not really at all.
Matthew’s very obvious, blunt speeches to Theo about acting upon the beliefs he espouses and fighting for the thing he supposedly wants are another way in which the protagonists are shown to be perhaps less than sincere in their revolutionary “fervor”. They all talk the talk, but they don’t act on it unless it is forced upon them, and even then, their leaping into the fray (very noticeably, only at the conclusion of the movie) seems like a last-ditch effort to **appear** as if they’re participating in a meaningful manner. Matthew, the foreigner who has the least to directly gain, is the one who holds off on the violence, sticking to his belief in non-violence and trying to be rational; he is the only one who consistently acts on his beliefs throughout. That certainly leads to an interesting, incredibly problematic image presented in The Dreamers: that those who do nothing in a revolution are the reasonable ones and those who participate are hypocrites (when looking at the movie’s lead, named characters).
The youth was of course a large part of 68. But why? What was the catalyst that created large scale action by students and young people across the world? As Richard Ivan Jobs points out in his essay “Youth Movements: Travel, Protests, and Europe”, the individuals who made up the student movements no longer identified themselves as members of a particular nation, but as a continent-wide, transnational social group. Nationalism had died, and internationalism was born. The way you thought about political ideas and reforms had more to do with age than with origin. Jobs points out the revolutionary stalwarts of the time that were leaders of movements in countries that they weren’t born in, Che in Cuba and Bolivia, Dutschke in West Germany. Much of this had to do with more young people traveling internationally because of exchange programs and hostile networks that were set up post World War II to “promote international understanding and cooperation.” This push brought a large number of young people from very different backgrounds together, to live in quasi-communities. This can be seen in the movie Dreamers (2003), through the character of Matthew who lives for a year in Paris to learn French. These students were mobile and would move with the revolution from Paris to Prague, or anywhere there was revolution, Munich, Florence, Berlin. Along with these travelers came a culture that challenged social convention and the structures of authority. Another small part of this growth in ‘internationalistic pride’ amongst the younger generation may be from the workers exchange programs that began post WWII. I know this was a major part of rebuilding the West German Economy after the war. This may have brought the issues of the various countries that brought workers into West German culture.
Since viewing The Dreamers I have been wracking my brain in an effort to discern what exactly the usage of mirrors in the film means. Mirrors are everywhere in this film as are the reflections in them. In one particular scene we see all three characters in the bath together all of them are shown in the mirrors behind them facing opposite each other. Mirrors and reflections positively litter this movie, but I’m left to ask why. At a certain point it became obvious that the usage of mirrors was deliberate, but whether or not they actually mean anything is up for debate. So far the only answer I actually have to this question is “probably” I mean, I don’t know for sure what exactly the intention was, but I think I have a good guess.
The three main characters often mirror scenes from the films that they love I.E: the running through the louvre, the chorus line, the death scene from Scarface, etc. What is more important than this however is that Theo’s political ideals regarding Mao also seem to be no more than reflection. Mathew even points this out when he mentions the Maoist decorations in Theo’s room and his lack of action in the student movement/how he should be out on the street. The only point when Theo actually joins the movement is when it’s right outside his door, arguably the only reason he joins in is because it’s close and convenient. This might not exactly explain the usage of mirrors through the film in a concrete sort of way, but another possible explanation is that Theo and Annabelle mirror each other. This is a point that Matthew notes when he says “You’re like two halves of the same person”; a point that the film seems to drive home at numerous points through their inseparability and their general relationship. I believe that the use of mirrors in the film was to both show the relationship of the characters and accentuate it, or to show how the political ideology of Theo wasn’t exactly his own.
In the movie “The Dreamers” director Bernardo Bertolucci gives the viewers a drastically different view of the events of May 1968 in France than we saw from Olivier Assayas in “something in the air”. As Kyle said in his post, The Dreamers is told from the outside of the revolution, looking in (until the very end where Isabelle and Theo run in to the chaos and throw Molotov cocktails at riot police) whereas “something in the air” is strictly from an insider’s perspective. I thought this “outside looking in” perspective was interesting, since most of the films we have watched in this class are from the perspective of either the revolutionaries, or the people trying to stop the revolutionaries. The scenes themselves were for the most part not chaotic scenes of riots in the streets, or violence carried out by radical groups, instead it was of Mathew, Theo and Isabelle talking about revolution in Theo’s room, which is filled with “revolutionary” mementos: a light up lamp of Mao, and a poster of La Chinoise to name a few. That is one example of how this movie was filled with revolutionary idealism, but not very much action from any of the main characters until the very end of the film. When Mathew first meets Isabelle, she appears to be chained to a gate in protest. However she reveals that the chains aren’t actually bound. In my opinion this symbolizes the fact that Theo and Isabelle were revolutionary in their ideals, but hadn’t fully given themselves to the revolution yet. The three spent most of their time in Theo’s room, speaking about revolution, with no real responsibilities in life, all they had to do was cash the checks their Father left them. I think the thing that caused Theo to go out in to the streets that night was earlier in the film, when Mathew and Theo are arguing, Mathew points out the window and tells Theo that he should be “out there” demonstrating, not sitting in his father’s house sipping expensive wine talking about film and politics. This point is brought up by Richard Wollin in his article “May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics” when he says “the Communists had belittled the student insurrection as a revolt led by spoiled “daddy’s boys”—hence, from a working-class standpoint, irrelevant” (91). I think the film gives the viewers a great deal of insight on the culture and ideals that led to the youth revolt in France.
As Kyle, Daniel, and Jessica touched on the other french films that we have seen, such as, "Something in the Air" have been have been internal works. These directors made these films on based experiences that they have personally encountered. They were situations that they had lived first hand. In the film, "The Dreamers" directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, he is not only an outsider in the sense that he did not experience the events in the film first hand, but he is not from either of the country portrayed in the film. He is an Italian, speaking on the behalf of French affairs.
The film, "the Dreamers" is based on a book. In that book I imagine the same accounts happen that are in the film. This creates a rather interesting thing already. An Italian, an outsider to the french. Mathew is also an outsider to the French, so, an Italian is acting as an outsider, while telling the story of an American on the outside looking in. It has a kind of Matrix quality to it.
If 'The Dreamers' is about anything, it's certainly not the revolution; at least, not consciously or outwardly. The only thing 'The Dreamers' is willing to take a definite position on is, reflexively, the effect of New Wave cinema on the youth of the 1960s.
Because the main characters, especially Matthew, are not depicted as revolutionaries, or even as people who are particularly aware of what's going on in Paris; sure, they know about Vietnam, but they definitely aren't participating in the events around them. The scene where the camera slowly pans from Matthew and Isabelle to the barricade [as we know, a major symbol of Parisian resistance] is particularly effective at illustrating this. As viewers, the camera positions us behind the characters, giving us no indication that the famous barricades are close by, and when the camera moves to reveal them, it's surprising to us. It follows that it's surprising to Matthew and Isabelle as well.
What right, though, does Isabelle have to be surprised? If she doesn't know about the protests, the film invites us to imply, she's doing something wrong; when she refuses to watch the storefront television to catch even a second of the news brief, she's doing something particularly wrong. What's her line in that scene? 'Only the purest form'? I don't remember the exact words, but I know she was contrasting the television news briefs with the art films she's accustomed to watching in her bourgeois apartment. And, while there may be a certain defensibility to, say, her father's detached view, there's no arguing that Isabelle is doing the right thing by remaining wilfully ignorant.
Strangely, this brief indictment does not carry through the rest of the film. The references and clips, though they may have been from news reels in a previous film, were pulled from Godard, Chaplin, etc. Art film, not politics, is what 'The Dreamers' cares about; how can it insinuate that Isabelle should feel differently?
In Richard Ivan Jobs’ article youth movements: travel, protest and Europe in 1968 he make interesting arguments regarding how travel amongst young Europeans instigated a sort of “transnational social group” at the time surrounding 1968. This travel created awareness of all Europeans and many young Europeans were becoming involved in the politics and revolutions in countries that were not their own, and this was also seen at an international level. Jobs states, “These communities of young travelers contributed to the ethos of integration through their familiarity with one another and their experiences with foreign places, peoples and cultures” (378). In the film Dreamers, we are introduced to an American traveling to Europe during this time of revolution, Matthew, who meets French twins Isabelle and Theo, children of a famous poet. While the theme of unity and oneness is seen in the relationship between Theo, Isabelle, and Matthew the theme of politics is addressed a bit differently. Now I don’t really feel that Isabelle and Theo were as interested in becoming a part of the transnational politics that were taking place as much as Matthew might have been, and to this point there is an interesting statement made at dinner when Theo’s father is speaking to him and says, “Listen to me, Theo. Before you can change the world you must realize that you, yourself, are part of it. You can't stand outside looking in.” There is something to be said for how comfortable Isabelle and Theo are in their own relationship and the kind of turned eye that they have of the politics and realities of the world at the time. For example, there are a few scenes where they are either cooking or indulging in one another while tear gas is dispersing riots on the streets.They do join these riots to an extent but aren't actively involved in the politics. I felt that it was interesting that the father was communicating this idea of international involvement when Jobs, was speaking of the generation that would be the age of Theo and Isabelle in his article.
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DeleteYes, and with the opening credits sequence, starting the film with the Eiffel Tower is appropriate given it is undoubtedly the #1 tourist attraction in Paris. The irony is that most of the film is spent in the housing complex than touring the city despite the fact that in the late 1950s/early1960s many European countries undergo an economic boom through an increase in urbanization, thereby more people are receiving disposable income and are purchasing cars, television sets, and home appliances. With Jobs’ article stating that “young people were increasingly viewing the world in international terms,” this notion of the economic boom and tourism help explain how “news travels fast” globally and how younger people would become more aware of unfamiliar countries and culture. It’s also interesting to note that Michael arrives in Paris in the spring of 1968 when the article states that “ordinary tourists” stayed away from the city due to the recent protests. Michael, as he admits though at the beginning of the film, is no ordinary tourist as he is privileged to be among a small “cult” of film enthusiasts.
The scene where Theo and Isabelle’s parents discover the three sleeping together, to me, that seems the film attempts to take a “moral” position on the character’s actions for throughout the film acts in a very playful manner with the group whether it involves intercutting black–and–white film footage within a scene or using specific staging and lighting to make Isabelle appear like a Greek sculpture.
As all the characters are ascribing to Timothy Leary’s theory of “turn on, tune in, and drop out,” it is the youth revolution that “saves them.” I have not seen many of Bertolucci’s films, but from films like The Spider’s Stratagem and The Conformist, he definitely holds strong political beliefs, but I feel in this film, it is not clear if he is embracing the characters’ self–absorbed lifestyles or condemning them.
It seems odd to watch a film by an Italian director, about a Californian boy and two French siblings in Paris. Unlike "Something In The Air," "The Dreamers," does not appear to be inspired by actual events in the directors life. In fact, the film is based on the book "The Holy Innocents" by Gilbert Adair. So, this story isn't autobiographical, and is being told from the outside, looking in, instead of an insider perspective as in "Something in The Air."
ReplyDeleteAnd this is not the only difference between these two films."Something in the Air," because of it's auto-biographical nature, contains the sense of realism, of trying to portray the world and the time exactly as it was before. In "The Dreamers," the characters and the setting and the plot appear to be symbolic in nature. Matthew is from California, which is important, because that is where the height of 68 fervor is happening in America. He comes to Paris and meets Theo and Isabelle, who appear to be archetypes of the French youth of the time. A description of this archetype can be found in the essay May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics, where it states "This was a generation, once again, perhaps the first in history, for which the imperatives of material necessity ceased to dominate the every day life. Thus, unlike previous generations, postwar youth was increasingly able to turn its attention toward qualitative and spiritual pursuits." Theo and Isabelle are very well off, the children of an intellectual, who disregard the idea of getting a job. Their entire life appears to be leisure time.
And with all that freedom, they started wanting more freedom. Not just from a job or from capitalism, but freedom from cultural norms as well. Once again, from the May 1968 essay, "In the post-May period, the Situationist focus on everyday life fused with the Maoist notion of cultural revolution. In this way, the project of a revolution of everyday life was born. "Revolution" no longer meant seizing power or socializing the means of production. It connoted instead a grassroots transformation of interpersonal relations and living conditions." I'm fairly certain, that in every seen of incest in the film, Mao is somewhere in the room. But even if that isn't right, Mao is still in a surprising amount of shots. And this returns to my previous point. This incest is symbolic. It is an extreme outcome of extreme freedom. It is radical cultural revolution.
I feel as though Bertolucci’s The Dreamers does an effective job of navigating the murky waters of representing the student protestors during the events of May ’68, reflecting on both their criticism and their apparent strengths. For example, the film expends quite a bit of energy exploring the issue of privileged bourgeois students engaging in Marxist/Maoist/Communist discourse through the character Théo, who, although interested in shaking things up, is shown at first to be somewhat passive and ineffective in his political theorizing. Throughout his bedroom are tokens emblematic of Théo’s political leanings, a light up Mao lamp and a gigantic poster for Godard’s La Chinoise to name a few examples, yet the fact that we know how he lays around his apartment all day and relies on his father to provide disposable income by leaving checks on the mantle somewhat damages his credibility. This idea is represents the views of criticisms of the student movement at the time in which, as Peter Wollen describes, “the Communists had belittled the student insurrection as a revolt led by spoiled “daddy’s boys”—hence, from a working-class standpoint, irrelevant” (91). This criticism is mirrored somewhat by Matthew when the two are arguing politics, pointing out the window and claiming that Théo should be out on the streets demonstrating instead of talking film and politics in isolation with him and his sister in their father’s apartment.
ReplyDeleteDespite his failings, however, Théo does, in the end, channel his political zeal into direct action and ends up on the front lines of the student standoff with the police. Once on the street, his immediate decision to head to the front and pick up a Molotov cocktail displays the idealistic commitment that the students showed in their spontaneous protests and demonstrations. Political posters and graffiti that cover the outer walls of buildings and constantly droning police sirens in the distance are spread throughout the film to further evidence the ongoing struggle of the students, demonstrating that, even though Théo might not yet have joined the fray, there were others like him in the streets spreading a message. Despite the criticisms of the established Communist and Maoist groups who dismissed their efforts as, in Wollen’s words, “lacking the requisite proletarian content,” the students still managed to organize “the largest demonstration Paris had seen since the Popular Front era” (92). The students were putting feet on the ground and making an effort to shake things up leaving “the Communists and their allies, the CGT, trailing contritely behind” (92).
Bertolucci’s “The Dreamers” seems to be inspired from an outsider perspective. Mathew being from California, where the largest film industry in the U.S is located gets overlooked as a vital character to establishing Isabelle as a Marxist, as well as Mathew’s attempts to sway the Théo towards a non-violent activist approach. Mathew in my opinion makes the biggest impact on the film. Its through his eyes that we get to know the true characters of Théo and Isabelle.
ReplyDeleteI find it intriguing that instead of waking up the three sleeping in a makeshift fort that typically kids would build, the parents instead leave another check for them to cash and leave, never to be seen in the film again. I feel that the point of this scene is to establish inconsistencies with Théo and Isabelle’s association with the student movement. The parents are giving them money and funding their alcohol fueled social escapades and not holding them accountable. Théo was viewed as the dominate one of the relationship between the three of them and The end scene of the three of them joining people gathered in the street for a demonstration came as a surprise. It gave me the impression that Théo was easily influenced and mislead by his attachment to Isabelle. Mathew joining Théo and his sister’s complex relationship is instrumental in understanding how the director displays the evolution of student relationships during the student movement. Breaking traditional norms was a consistent theme in “The Dreamers”. There were clearly multiple scenes in the film that were designated to the taboo of incest. These scenes are clearly hard to elaborate and make sense of. From my understanding though, these controversial scenes represent a raw sense of individualism and liberation.
Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers deals with the youth revolutions in Paris, through the minds of the youth themselves. Although through the majority of the film, we do not see the revolts as they happen, we do get a sense of what is going on. The first time Matthew meets Theo and Isabelle, they are at a protest. You can already see the contrast between the characters. Matthew, introverted and observational, Isabelle, sultry and mysterious, and Theo, distant and confident, yet all have strong beliefs and a love for the cinema. In Richard Wolin’s “May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics” he talks how the “middle-class youth had at its disposal the leisure time necessary for self-reflection and self-cultivation” (72). This was the perfect time for teenagers and young adults to reflect and try to understand what was going on in the world.
ReplyDeleteBut with this time to surround them with the real issues that were happening in the world, they needed a way to make sense and to make a difference. But in others, they got wrapped up in their own worlds, as does Isabelle and Theo and then more-so Matthew. Throughout the movie, we see the effects of that in the movie. Isabella and Theo are so submerged in the relationship that they share that when they befriend Matthew there façade of a world starts to crack, just as their own innocence. The interworking of the three-way relationship and the dynamics are seen in the real world. How the teenagers and young adults in different parts of the world are so submerged in the ideas that they conceived about how the war and the rest of the world should be dealt with.
The Dreamers (2003) was the most sexually open and progressive in the sense that it displayed a type of sexuality that would be considered obscene by traditional western standards. This sexuality was interesting because of the forefront roll that it took in the film. There was incestuous and homosexual tension that was expressed throughout the film, both of which were never shown. Both of these sexual acts would have been considered very taboo in the sixties.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find more interesting, however, is after reading Richard Ivan Jobs’ article Youth Movements: Travel, Protest, and Europe in 1968, I could not help but to see the relationship between the three characters as being a metaphor for the cultural integration that was occurring across the globe. The American, Matthew, was not embraced by just the French culture but French people as well. While the character of Matthew disagreed with Theo and Isabella, most notably about the soldiers in the Vietnam War and the use of violence as a means to an end, all three of them had a similar cultural experience through the movies that they had watched in love.
They defined themselves almost literally in the film by the films that they had watched. They acted out scenes and lived their lives like those of the characters in film. Their lives began to imitate art. They also used the knowledge of film to encourage each other to do things that they may not have been comfortable with. This is an instance of the characters using a shared experience to connect with one another. Shared experiences, in this case, led to a connectedness that would not have existed otherwise.
As Daniel has already pointed out, The Dreamers (2004) focuses mostly on the internal life of the students through their bourgeois status, their economic class, their privileged education, and their purely ideological practice. While the film experiences limitations from being an adaptation of the book The Holy Innocents by Gilbert Adair, the film further experiences limitations through the spatial restrictions. This focusing of limitation forces the audience to take a close-up look at the “revolutionaries,” not as trouble-maker, but as people within the context of their lived experiences and private spaces. When depicted in the streets, throwing rocks, kicking, screaming, and revolting, it is simple to washout individualism and generalize the student movement of the late 1960s as a mindless,violent mob.
ReplyDeleteWhat Bernardo Betolucci accomplished is to view his characters through “their unself-conscious intensity, grazing affectionately at these children who speak solemnly of ‘cinema’...and for whom the movies, far from being an escape from the world, are a means of entry into it” (Scott). Neither accidental, or unsupported, the specific usage of the word “children” to depict the characters is well mirrored throughout the film. From the Victorian feel of Isabelle’s bedroom, which holds a pristine disassociation from the rest of the trashed house, to her teddy bears, to the childish games, to the “clean” incestuous relationship, to the economic dependence, etc., the characters get caught in the safety of the interior and the denial of the exterior.
This metaphor for the fine light between childhood and adulthood is most poignantly depicted when their abandonment of the interior is protected by their attempts to bring the childish safety to the exterior, as when they play games at the Louvre, run carelessly through the rain, or go on an innocent date. Matthew’s character, which as the film progresses becomes aware of it, questions the attitudes and behaviors of his friends. Throughout, they are confronted by the realities of life, they’re refusal to accept and to grow concludes through the literal infiltration of the outside to the inside. With the interior contaminated by the outside, they can’t deny their evolution from children into adults. Theo’s action to throw the bottle is as significant as Matthew’s decision to abandon the resistance. It is no longer a game. It is real life, and it comes with real consequences.
Furthermore, the disassociation of the characters to the burning world outside, to the “revolution,” to the counterculture, infiltrates through their fixation and idealization of the movies, of the ideas, of the possibilities--showing that even the most guarded,oblivious youth was affected by the environment. This overarching influence of the world into all places serves The Dreamers well. As the audience, we can observe their private lives, the behind closed doors intimacies, but we can also feel the inescapable sense of the times, the homogeneous idealism and believes. The film has the Hollywood spectacle, but it also has the influences of a well-experienced, knowledgeable filmmaker who contemplates the past in a wickedly romantic, and uncensored crude manner. Again to quote Scott’s review, “movie love is not only the subject of ''The Dreamers,'' but also its method,” (Scott).
Scott, A. O. “The Dreamers (2003): FILM REVIEW; When to Be Young Was Very Sexy,” The New York Times. Feb. 6, 2014. Web. Oct.7, 2014.
The most important thing to keep in mind while watching The Dreamers (Bernardo Bertolucci, 2003) is that it is a fairly un-self-aware depiction of the revolution through the lens of bourgeoisie youth. Even more important than the cultural differences between the American Matthew and the French twins Isabelle and Theo is the contrast of these young adults who can afford (literally) to lounge about in a cushy penthouse while revolution rages on the street outside (literally). The fact that this is all literally shown, on screen, might make it seem that perhaps the movie is a little more aware of its privileged point of view, but tonally and narratively, it is not. For example, a rock has be thrown through the window to (again, literally) wake up the trio of lovers to the facts of the revolution.
ReplyDeleteAnd the revolution is not even the focus of The Dreamers. Although it opens with the closing of the cinema – which at first seems like it could be a jumping-on point for activism – the national turmoil is utterly sidelined to instead focus on the youths hanging out while the parents are away; without the older generation who remembers what revolution used to/can/should be like and who will challenge the younger generation to get off their tuckuses and DO SOMETHING CONSTRUCTIVE, the indolent children act as they please, which is to say not really at all.
Matthew’s very obvious, blunt speeches to Theo about acting upon the beliefs he espouses and fighting for the thing he supposedly wants are another way in which the protagonists are shown to be perhaps less than sincere in their revolutionary “fervor”. They all talk the talk, but they don’t act on it unless it is forced upon them, and even then, their leaping into the fray (very noticeably, only at the conclusion of the movie) seems like a last-ditch effort to **appear** as if they’re participating in a meaningful manner. Matthew, the foreigner who has the least to directly gain, is the one who holds off on the violence, sticking to his belief in non-violence and trying to be rational; he is the only one who consistently acts on his beliefs throughout. That certainly leads to an interesting, incredibly problematic image presented in The Dreamers: that those who do nothing in a revolution are the reasonable ones and those who participate are hypocrites (when looking at the movie’s lead, named characters).
The youth was of course a large part of 68. But why? What was the catalyst that created large scale action by students and young people across the world? As Richard Ivan Jobs points out in his essay “Youth Movements: Travel, Protests, and Europe”, the individuals who made up the student movements no longer identified themselves as members of a particular nation, but as a continent-wide, transnational social group. Nationalism had died, and internationalism was born. The way you thought about political ideas and reforms had more to do with age than with origin. Jobs points out the revolutionary stalwarts of the time that were leaders of movements in countries that they weren’t born in, Che in Cuba and Bolivia, Dutschke in West Germany.
ReplyDeleteMuch of this had to do with more young people traveling internationally because of exchange programs and hostile networks that were set up post World War II to “promote international understanding and cooperation.” This push brought a large number of young people from very different backgrounds together, to live in quasi-communities. This can be seen in the movie Dreamers (2003), through the character of Matthew who lives for a year in Paris to learn French. These students were mobile and would move with the revolution from Paris to Prague, or anywhere there was revolution, Munich, Florence, Berlin. Along with these travelers came a culture that challenged social convention and the structures of authority.
Another small part of this growth in ‘internationalistic pride’ amongst the younger generation may be from the workers exchange programs that began post WWII. I know this was a major part of rebuilding the West German Economy after the war. This may have brought the issues of the various countries that brought workers into West German culture.
Since viewing The Dreamers I have been wracking my brain in an effort to discern what exactly the usage of mirrors in the film means. Mirrors are everywhere in this film as are the reflections in them. In one particular scene we see all three characters in the bath together all of them are shown in the mirrors behind them facing opposite each other. Mirrors and reflections positively litter this movie, but I’m left to ask why. At a certain point it became obvious that the usage of mirrors was deliberate, but whether or not they actually mean anything is up for debate. So far the only answer I actually have to this question is “probably” I mean, I don’t know for sure what exactly the intention was, but I think I have a good guess.
ReplyDeleteThe three main characters often mirror scenes from the films that they love I.E: the running through the louvre, the chorus line, the death scene from Scarface, etc. What is more important than this however is that Theo’s political ideals regarding Mao also seem to be no more than reflection. Mathew even points this out when he mentions the Maoist decorations in Theo’s room and his lack of action in the student movement/how he should be out on the street. The only point when Theo actually joins the movement is when it’s right outside his door, arguably the only reason he joins in is because it’s close and convenient.
This might not exactly explain the usage of mirrors through the film in a concrete sort of way, but another possible explanation is that Theo and Annabelle mirror each other. This is a point that Matthew notes when he says “You’re like two halves of the same person”; a point that the film seems to drive home at numerous points through their inseparability and their general relationship.
I believe that the use of mirrors in the film was to both show the relationship of the characters and accentuate it, or to show how the political ideology of Theo wasn’t exactly his own.
In the movie “The Dreamers” director Bernardo Bertolucci gives the viewers a drastically different view of the events of May 1968 in France than we saw from Olivier Assayas in “something in the air”. As Kyle said in his post, The Dreamers is told from the outside of the revolution, looking in (until the very end where Isabelle and Theo run in to the chaos and throw Molotov cocktails at riot police) whereas “something in the air” is strictly from an insider’s perspective. I thought this “outside looking in” perspective was interesting, since most of the films we have watched in this class are from the perspective of either the revolutionaries, or the people trying to stop the revolutionaries.
ReplyDeleteThe scenes themselves were for the most part not chaotic scenes of riots in the streets, or violence carried out by radical groups, instead it was of Mathew, Theo and Isabelle talking about revolution in Theo’s room, which is filled with “revolutionary” mementos: a light up lamp of Mao, and a poster of La Chinoise to name a few. That is one example of how this movie was filled with revolutionary idealism, but not very much action from any of the main characters until the very end of the film. When Mathew first meets Isabelle, she appears to be chained to a gate in protest. However she reveals that the chains aren’t actually bound. In my opinion this symbolizes the fact that Theo and Isabelle were revolutionary in their ideals, but hadn’t fully given themselves to the revolution yet.
The three spent most of their time in Theo’s room, speaking about revolution, with no real responsibilities in life, all they had to do was cash the checks their Father left them. I think the thing that caused Theo to go out in to the streets that night was earlier in the film, when Mathew and Theo are arguing, Mathew points out the window and tells Theo that he should be “out there” demonstrating, not sitting in his father’s house sipping expensive wine talking about film and politics. This point is brought up by Richard Wollin in his article “May 1968: The Triumph of Libidinal Politics” when he says “the Communists had belittled the student insurrection as a revolt led by spoiled “daddy’s boys”—hence, from a working-class standpoint, irrelevant” (91). I think the film gives the viewers a great deal of insight on the culture and ideals that led to the youth revolt in France.
As Kyle, Daniel, and Jessica touched on the other french films that we have seen, such as, "Something in the Air" have been have been internal works. These directors made these films on based experiences that they have personally encountered. They were situations that they had lived first hand. In the film, "The Dreamers" directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, he is not only an outsider in the sense that he did not experience the events in the film first hand, but he is not from either of the country portrayed in the film. He is an Italian, speaking on the behalf of French affairs.
ReplyDeleteThe film, "the Dreamers" is based on a book. In that book I imagine the same accounts happen that are in the film. This creates a rather interesting thing already. An Italian, an outsider to the french. Mathew is also an outsider to the French, so, an Italian is acting as an outsider, while telling the story of an American on the outside looking in. It has a kind of Matrix quality to it.
After reading your comment, I was curious about how much of the book was actually in the movie.
Deletehttp://www.oxonianreview.org/issues/3-3/3-3-2.htm
This might be worth a read!
If 'The Dreamers' is about anything, it's certainly not the revolution; at least, not consciously or outwardly. The only thing 'The Dreamers' is willing to take a definite position on is, reflexively, the effect of New Wave cinema on the youth of the 1960s.
ReplyDeleteBecause the main characters, especially Matthew, are not depicted as revolutionaries, or even as people who are particularly aware of what's going on in Paris; sure, they know about Vietnam, but they definitely aren't participating in the events around them. The scene where the camera slowly pans from Matthew and Isabelle to the barricade [as we know, a major symbol of Parisian resistance] is particularly effective at illustrating this. As viewers, the camera positions us behind the characters, giving us no indication that the famous barricades are close by, and when the camera moves to reveal them, it's surprising to us. It follows that it's surprising to Matthew and Isabelle as well.
What right, though, does Isabelle have to be surprised? If she doesn't know about the protests, the film invites us to imply, she's doing something wrong; when she refuses to watch the storefront television to catch even a second of the news brief, she's doing something particularly wrong. What's her line in that scene? 'Only the purest form'? I don't remember the exact words, but I know she was contrasting the television news briefs with the art films she's accustomed to watching in her bourgeois apartment. And, while there may be a certain defensibility to, say, her father's detached view, there's no arguing that Isabelle is doing the right thing by remaining wilfully ignorant.
Strangely, this brief indictment does not carry through the rest of the film. The references and clips, though they may have been from news reels in a previous film, were pulled from Godard, Chaplin, etc. Art film, not politics, is what 'The Dreamers' cares about; how can it insinuate that Isabelle should feel differently?