The Dreamers (Original Uncut NC-17 Version)
ThoughThe Dreamersis rife with naked flesh, the DVD extras focus  more on history and politics--one featurette describes the student unrest  of May 1968, which led to national strikes (at one point, 10 million  workers were on strike); Gilbert Adair, who adapted the screenplay from  his novel, describes the lingering smell that hung over Paris from  uncollected garbage and residual tear gas. A making-of featurette is  impressively in-depth, richly exploring the intersection of cinema,  politics, and sex in director Bernardo Bertolucci's mind. Then the  commentary track itself features three different perspectives: Bertolucci  focuses on the philosophical and aesthetic underpinnings of the film,  Adair discusses its relationship to his own experience in 1968 and the  process of adaptation, and producer Jeremy Thomas lays out a more  logistical perspective on the making of the movie. All in all, a dense and fertile exploration of the movie's development. The NC-17 cut is the version that played in theaters.--Bret Fetzer